STEEL 

The  Diary  of  a  Furnace  Worker 


STEEL 

The  Diary  of  a 
Furnace  Worker 


By 
CHARLES  RUMFORD  WALKER 


THE  ATLANTIC  MONTHLY  PRESS 
BOSTON 


Copyright,  1922,  by 
CHARLES  RUMFORD  WALKER 


PUNTED   IN   THE   UNITED   STATES   OF  AMERICA 


Foreword 

IN  the  summer  of  1919,  a  few  weeks  before  the 
Great  Steel  Strike,  I  bought  some  second-hand 
clothes  and  went  to  work  on  an  open-hearth  fur- 
nace near  Pittsburgh  to  learn  the  steel  business.  I  was 
a  graduate  of  Yale,  and  a  few  weeks  before  had  re- 
signed a  commission  as  first-lieutenant  in  the  regular 
army.  Clean-up  man  in  the  pit  was  my  first  job, 
which  I  held  until  I  passed  to  third-helper  on  the 
open-hearth.  Later  I  worked  in  the  cast-house,  be- 
came a  member  of  the  stove-gang,  and  at  length 
achieved  the  semi-skilled  job  of  hot-blast  man  on  the 
blast-furnace.  I  acquired  the  current  Anglo-Hunky 
language  and  knew  speedily  the  grind  and  the  cama- 
raderie of  American  steel-making.  In  these  chapters  I 
have  put  down  what  I  saw,  felt,  and  thought  as  a 
steel-worker  in  1919. 

Steel  is  perhaps  the  basic  industry  of  America.  In 
a  sense  it  is  the  industry  that  props  our  complex  indus- 
trial civilization,  since  it  supplies  the  steel  frame,  the 
steel  rail,  the  steel  tool  without  which  locomotives  and 
skyscrapers  would  be  impossible.  And  in  America  it 
contains  the  largest  known  combination  of  manage- 
ment and  capital,  the  United  States  Steel  Corpora- 
tion. Some  appreciation  of  these  things  I  had  when  I 
went  to  work  in  the  steel  business.  It  was  clear  that 


v 


steel  had  become  something  of  a  barometer  not  only 
for  American  business  but  for  American  labor.  I  was 
keenly  interested  to  know  what  would  happen,  and 
believed  that  basic  industries  like  steel  and  coal  were 
cast  for  leading  roles  either  in  the  breaking-up  or  the 
making-over  of  society. 

The  book  is  written  from  a  diary  of  notes  put  down 
in  the  evenings  when  I  was  working  on  day  shifts  of 
ten  hours.  Alternate  weeks,  I  worked  the  fourteen- 
hour  night  shift,  and  spent  my  time  off  eating  or 
asleep. 

The  book  is  a  narrative  —  heat,  fatigue,  rough- 
house,  pay,  as  they  came  in  an  uncharted  wave 
throughout  the  twenty-four  hours. 

But  it  is  in  a  sense  raw  material,  I  believe,  that  sug- 
gests the  beginnings  of  several  studies  both  human 
and  economic.  Mr.  Walter  Lippmann  has  recently 
pointed  out  that  men  do  not  act  in  accordance  with 
the  facts  and  forces  of  the  world  as  it  is,  but  in  accord- 
ance with  the  "  picture  "  of  it  they  have  in  their  heads.1 
Nowhere  does  the  form  and  pressure  of  the  real  world 
differ  more  sharply  from  the  picture  in  men's  heads 
than  among  different  social  and  racial  groups  in  indus- 
try. Nor  is  anywhere  the  accuracy  of  the  picture  of 
more  importance.  An  open-hearth  furnace  helper, 
working  the  twelve-hour  day,  and  a  Boston  broker, 
owning  fifty  shares  of  Steel  Preferred,  hold,  as  a  rule, 
strikingly  different  pictures  of  the  same  forces  and 
conditions.  But  what  is  of  greater  importance  is  that 
director,  manager,  foreman,  by  reason  of  training, 

1  Public  Opinion:  Harcourt,  Brace  and  Company,  1922 


FOREWORD  vii 

interest,  or  tradition,  are  often  quite  as  unable  to 
guess  at  the  picture  in  the  worker's  head,  and  hence 
to  understand  his  actions,  as  the  more  distant  stock- 
holder. 

Perhaps  a  technique  may  some  day  arise  which  will 
supply  the  executives  of  industry  not  only  with  the 
facts  about  employees  in  their  varied  racial  and  social 
groups  but  supply  the  facts  with  due  emphasis  and  in 
three  dimensions  so  that  the  controller  of  power  may 
be  able  to  see  them  as  descriptive  of  men  of  like 
mind  with  himself.  The  conclusion  most  burned  into 
my  consciousness  was  the  lack  of  such  knowledge  or 
understanding  in  the  steel  industry  and  the  impera- 
tive need  of  securing  it,  in  order  to  escape  continual 
industrial  war,  and  perhaps  disaster. 

There  are  certain  inferences,  I  think,  like  the  above, 
that  can  be  made  from  this  record.  But  no  thesis  has 
been  introduced  and  no  argument  developed.  I  have 
recorded  the  impressions  of  a  complex  environment, 
putting  into  words  sight,  sound,  feeling,  and  thought. 
The  book  may  be  read  as  a  story  of  men  and  machines 
and  a  personal  adventure  among  them  no  less  than 
as  a  study  of  conditions  and  a  system. 

C.  R.  W. 


Contents 

I     CAMP  EUSTIS 

Bouton,  Pennsylvania 1 

II     MOLTEN  STEEL  IN  THE  "PIT" 

An  Initiation 16 

III  THE  OPEN-HEARTH  FURNACE 

Night-Shifts 30 

IV  EVERYDAY  LIFE 45 

V    WORKING  THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR 

SHIFT 62 

VI     BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP     ...  81 

VII     DUST,  HEAT,  AND  COMRADESHIP  ....  96 

VIII     I  TAKE  A  DAY  OFF 114 

IX    "No  CAN  LIVE"      127 

EPILOGUE  141 


S  T  E  EL 


CAMP  EUSTIS  —  BOUTON,  PENNSYLVANIA 

A  SMALL  torrent  of  khaki  swept  on  to  the  ferryboat 
that  was  taking  troops  to  the  special  train  for  Camp 
Merritt.  They  stood  all  over  her  deck,  in  uncomfort- 
ably small  areas ;  there  seemed  to  be  no  room  for  the 
pack,  which  perhaps  you  were  expected  to  swallow. 
Faces  were  a  little  pale  from  seasickness,  but  carried 
a  uniformly  radiant  expression,  which  proceeded  from 
a  lively  anticipation  of  civilian  happiness.  The  con- 
versation was  ejaculatory,  and  included  slapping  and 
digging  and  squeezing  your  neighbor.  Men  were  say- 
ing over  and  over  again:  "This  is  about  the  last  li'l  war 
they  '11  ketch  me  for." 

I  succeeded  in  getting  beside  the  civilian  pilot. 

"What's  happening  in  America?"   I  asked. 

"Oh,"  he  said,  "it's  a  mess  over  here.  There  ain't 
any  jobs,  and  labor  is  raisin'  hell.  Everybody  that  hez 
a  job  strikes."  He  looked  out  over  the  water  at  a  tug 
hurrying  past.  "I  don't  know  what  we're  comin'  out 
at.  Russia,  mebbe." 

In  the  spring  of  the  year  Camp  Eustis  was  an  island 
of  concrete  roads  and  wooden  barracks  salvaged  from 
an  encroaching  sea  of  mud.  Its  site  had  been  selected 
at  an  immense  distance  from  any  village,  or  even  any 


2  STEEL 

collection  of  .human  dwellings,  for  particular  reasons. 
It  v/as  tc>  .contain  the  longest  artillery  range  in  the 
United  States. 

After  wallowing  in  bog  road  through  Virginian 
forest,  one  came  with  a  shock  of  relief  to  a  wide, 
raised,  concrete  roadbed,  which  passed  newly  built 
warehouses  and,  after  an  eighth  of  a  mile,  curved  into 
the  centre  of  the  camp. 

It  was  like  any  one  of  the  score  of  mushroom  mili- 
tary centres  that  grew  up  on  American  soil  in  the 
years  from  1917  to  1919,  except  that  there  was  an  un- 
usual abundance  of  heavy  guns.  They  covered  field 
upon  field,  opposite  the  ordnance  warehouses,  and 
their  yellow  and  green  camouflage  looked  absurdly 
showy  in  the  spring  sunshine.  Mornings,  there  was 
apt  to  be  a  captive  balloon  or  two  afloat  from  the 
balloon  school,  against  blue  sky  and  white  clouds; 
and  the  landscape  held  several  gaunt  observation 
towers,  constructed  of  steel  girders  and  rising  from 
the  forest  to  a  height  of  seventy-five  or  eighty  feet. 

The  camp  was  crowded  with  returning  overseas 
units,  awaiting  demobilization  and  praying  earnestly 
for  it  day  by  day,  as  men  pray  for  pardon. 

In  a  few  weeks  I  should  be  out  of  this,  going  to  work 
somewhere,  wearing  cits.  What  a  variety  of  moods  the 
world  had  split  into,  from  the  enormous  tension  that 
relaxed  on  the  eleventh  of  November.  Geographically 
the  training-camp  was  two  thousand  miles  from  the 
devastations  of  Europe;  and  from  the  new  forces  that 
were  destroying  or  renewing  civilization,  how  many 
more?  It  seemed  like  the  aftermath  of  an  exciting 


CAMP  EUSTIS  3 

play  that  had  just  been  acted;  waiting  here  was  like 
staying  to  put  away  properties,  and  dismiss  the  actors. 
It  occurred  to  me  that  the  camp  was  at  least  ten 
thousand  miles  from  America. 

There  was  one  consolation  in  this  interminable 
lingering  amid  the  spring  muds  and  rains  of  Virginia. 
Duties  were  light,  and  there  were  a  hundred  and  fifty 
cavalry  horses  in  the  stables,  needing  exercise.  Some- 
times we  went  out  on  the  drill-ground  and  were  taught 
tricks  by  an  old  cavalry  officer;  or  hurdles  were  set  up 
and  we  practised  jumping  our  horses.  The  roads  were 
deeply  gutted  by  spring  rains  and  the  pressure  of 
heavy  trucks,  but  there  were  wood-trails  good  to  ex- 
plore, and  interesting  objectives  like  Williamstown  or 
Yorktown.  I  fell  into  doing  my  thinking  in  the  saddle. 

Naturally  I  wondered  about  my  new  job  —  my 
civilian  job.  It  was  not  just  an  ordinary  change  from 
one  breadwinning  place  to  another.  It  was  a  new  job 
in  a  world  never  convertible  quite  to  the  one  that  had 
kindled  the  war.  It  was  impossible  not  to  feel  that  the 
civilized  structure  had  shaken  and  disintegrated  a  bit, 
or  to  escape  the  sense  of  great  powers  released.  I  was 
unable  to  decide  whether  the  powers  were  cast  for  a 
role  of  great  destruction  or  of  great  renewal. 

Even  in  Eustis  we  received  newspapers.  The  urge 
and  groan  of  those  powers  naturally  worked  into 
phrases  now  and  then,  and  even  into  special  tightly 
worded  formulae.  I  remember  newspaper  ejacula- 
tions, professorial  dissertations,  orators'  exaggera- 
tions :  "  Capital  and  labor  —  Labor  in  its  place  —  The 
proletariat  —  A  new  order" — and  so  forth.  I  felt 


4  STEEL 

confused  and  distrustful  in  the  face  of  phrases  and 
of  the  implied  doctrines,  old  and  new. 

Besides  the  business  of  demobilizing  the  national 
army,  the  remaining  regular  officers  and  non-coms 
went  into  the  school  of  fire,  and  practised  observation 
of  shots  over  a  beautiful  relief  map  of  the  "Chemin- 
des-Dames."  This  was  the  most  warlike  thing  we  did 
and  continued  for  several  months. 

One  day  I  took  a  walk  beside  the  ordnance  ware- 
houses, and  looked  over  at  the  rows  of  guns  stretching 
for  a  quarter  of  a  mile  beside  railroad  tracks.  In  a 
short  time  I  would  be  turning  my  back  on  these  com- 
plicated engines.  I  was  even  sorry  about  it,  a  little; 
I  had  spent  so  much  sweat  and  brain  learning  about 
their  crankinesses. 

In  that  civil  life  to  follow,  I  began  to  see  that  I 
wanted  two  things:  1,  a  job  to  give  me  a  living;  2,  a 
chance  to  discover  and  build  under  the  new  social  and 
economic  conditions. 

I  was  twenty-five,  a  college  graduate,  a  first-lieu- 
tenant in  the  army.  In  the  civilian  world  into  which 
I  was  about  to  jump,  most  of  my  connections  were 
with  the  university  I  had  recently  left,  few  or  none  in 
the  business  world.  Why  not  enlist,  then,  in  one  of  the 
basic  industries,  coal,  oil,  or  steel?  I  liked  steel  —  it 
was  the  basic  American  industry,  and  technically  and 
economically  it  interested  me.  Why  not  enlist  in  steel  ? 
Get  a  laborer's  job?  Learn  the  business  ?  And,  besides, 
the  chemical  forces  of  change,  I  meditated,  were  at 
work  at  the  bottom  of  society  — 


CAMP  EUSTIS  5 

The  next  day  I  sent  in  the  resignation  of  my  com- 
mission in  the  regular  army  of  the  United  States. 

Outside  the  car  window,  ore  piles  were  visible, 
black  stacks  and  sooty  sheet-iron  mills,  coal  dumps 
and  jagged  cuts  in  the  hills  against  greenness  and  the 
meadows  and  mountains  beyond.  There  were  farms, 
here  and  there,  but  they  seemed  to  have  been  let  in 
by  sufferance  amid  the  primary  apparatus  of  the 
steel-makers. 

What  an  amazingly  primary  thing  steel  had  become 
in  the  civilization  we  called  modern!  Steel  was  the 
basic  industry  of  America ;  but,  more  than  that,  it  was, 
in  a  sense,  the  buttress,  the  essential  frame,  rather,  of 
present-day  life.  It  made  rails,  surgical  instruments, 
the  girders  of  skyscrapers,  the  tools  which  cut,  bored, 
and  filed  all  the  other  tools  that  made,  in  their  turn, 
the  material  basis  of  our  living.  It  was  interesting  to 
think  that  it  contained  America's  biggest  "trust," 
the  greatest  example  of  integration,  of  financial,  of 
managerial  combination,  anywhere  to  be  found. 
Steel  was  critical  in  America's  future,  was  n't  it  — 
critical  for  business,  critical  for  labor? 

I  met  a  salesman  on  the  train,  who  was  about  to  go 
into  business  for  himself.  "I  intend  to  start  out  on  a 
new  tack,"  he  said. 

He  told  me  briefly  his  life-story,  and  how  things 
were  forcing  him  to  start  a  new  enterprise,  alone.  He 
was  very  much  excited  by  the  idea.  He  was  going  to 
quit  his  employer,  having  been  with  him  twenty-nine 
years. 


6  STEEL 

"I'm  getting  a  new  job  myself,"  I  said;  "I've  just 
got  out  of  the  army." 

We  both  fell  into  silence,  and  thought  of  our  own 
separate  futures. 

What  were  a  young  man's  chances  in  American 
business  to-day?  I  thought  of  a  book  I  had  just  been 
reading  called,  "The  Age  of  Big  Business."  In  it  was 
the  story  of  the  first  captains  who  saw  a  vision  of 
immense  material  development,  and  with  the  utmost 
vigor  and  hardihood  pushed  on  and  marked  the  lead- 
ing trails.  But  apparently  the  affair  had  been  too 
roughly  done,  the  structure  too  crudely  wrought: 
machinery  jarred,  broke,  threatened  to  bring  life 
down  in  a  rusty  heap.  "No,  you  are  wrong,"  I  fancied 
the  business  leader  saying;  "it  is  the  agitator  who,  by 
dwelling  on  imaginary  ills,  has  stirred  up  the  masses 
of  mankind." 

I  gazed  out  of  the  window  at  the  black  mills  as  we 
passed  them.  I  was  about  to  learn  the  steel  business. 
I  knew  perfectly  well  that  the  men  who  built  this 
basic  structure  were  as  hardy  and  intelligent  —  no 
less  and  no  more  so,  I  hazarded  —  as  this  new  genera- 
tion of  mine.  But  the  job  —  difficult  technical  job 
though  it  was  —  appeared  too  simple  in  their  eyes. 
"Build  up  business,  and  society  will  take  care  of 
itself,"  they  had  said.  A  partial  breakdown,  a  partial 
revolution  had  resulted.  Perhaps  a  thoroughgoing 
revolution  threatened.  I  did  n't  know. 

I  knew  there  was  no  "solution."  There  was 
nothing  so  neat  as  that  for  this  multiform  condition. 
But  an  adjustment,  a  working  arrangement  would  be 


CAMP  EUSTIS  7 

found  out,  somehow,  by  my  generation.  I  expected  to 
discover  no  specific  —  no  formula  with  ribbons  — 
after  working  at  the  bottom  of  the  mill.  I  did  expect 
to  learn  something  of  the  practical  technique  of  mak- 
ing steel,  and  alongside  it,  —  despite,  or  perhaps  be- 
cause of,  an  outsider's  fresh  vision,  —  some  sense  of 
the  forces  getting  ready  at  the  bottom  of  things  to 
make  or  break  society.  Both  kinds  of  education  were 
certainly  up  to  my  generation. 

The  train  jarred  under  its  brakes,  and  began  to 
slow  down. 

"Good  luck,"  I  said  to  the  salesman;  "I  hope  you 
make  it  all  right." 

"Good  luck,"  he  said. 

The  train  stopped  and  I  found  the  Bouton  station, 
small  and  neatly  built,  of  a  gray  stone,  with  deeply 
overhanging  roof  and  Gothicized  windows.  It  seemed 
unrelated  to  the  rest  of  the  steel  community.  On  the 
right,  across  tracks,  loomed  a  dark  gathering  of  stacks 
arising  from  irregular  acres  of  sheet-iron  roofs.  Smoke- 
columns  of  various  texture,  some  colored  gold  from  an 
interior  light,  streaked  the  sky  immediately  above  the 
mill  stacks.  The  town  spread  itself  along  a  valley  and 
on  the  sides  of  encircling  hills  on  my  left.  In  the  fore- 
ground was  Main  Street,  with  stores  and  restaurants 
and  a  fruit-seller.  I  went  across  the  street  to  explore 
for  breakfast. 

"Can  I  look  at  the  job?"  I  asked. 

"Sure,"  he  said,  "you  can  look  at  the  job." 

I  walked  out  of  the  square,  brick  office  of  the 


8  STEEL 

open-hearth  foreman,  and  lost  my  way  in  a  maze  of 
railroad  tracks,  trestles,  and  small  brick  shanties,  at  last 
pushing  inside  a  blackened  sheet-iron  shell,  the  mill. 
I  entered  by  the  side,  following  fierce  white  lights 
shining  from  the  half-twilight  interior.  They  seemed 
immensely  brighter  than  the  warm  sun  in  the  heavens. 

I  was  first  conscious  of  the  blaring  mouths  of 
furnaces.  There  were  five  of  them,  and  men  with 
shovels  in  line,  marching  within  a  yard,  hurling  a 
white  gravel  down  red  throats.  Two  of  the  men  were 
stripped,  and  their  backs  were  shiny  in  the  red  flare. 
I  tried  to  feel  perfectly  at  home,  but  discovered  a  deep 
consciousness  of  being  overdressed.  My  straw  hat  I 
could  have  hurled  into  a  ladle  of  steel. 

Some  one  yelled,  "Watch  yourself!"  and  I  looked 
up,  with  some  horror,  to  note  half  the  mill  moving 
slowly  but  resolutely  onward,  bent  on  my  annihila- 
tion. I  was  mistaken.  It  was  the  charging-machine, 
rattling  and  grinding  past  furnace  No.  7. 

The  machine  is  a  monster,  some  forty  feet  from  head 
to  rear,  stretching  nearly  the  width  of  the  central  open 
space  in  the  mill.  The  tracks  on  which  it  proceeds  go 
the  whole  length,  in  front  of  all  the  furnaces.  I  dodged 
it,  or  rather  ran  from  it,  toward  what  appeared  open 
water,  but  found  there  more  tracks  for  stumbling.  An 
annoyed  whistle  lifted  itself  against  the  general  back- 
ground of  noise.  I  looked  over  my  shoulder.  It  re- 
lieved me  to  find  a  mere  locomotive.  I  knew  how  to 
cope  with  locomotives.  It  was  coming  at  me  leisurely, 
so  I  gave  it  an  interested  inspection  before  leaving  the 
track.  It  dragged  a  cauldron  of  exaggerated  propor- 


CAMP  EUSTIS  9 

tions  on  a  car  fitted  to  hold  it  easily.  A  dull  glow 
showed  from  inside,  and  a  swirl  of  sparks  and  smoke 
shot  up  and  lost  themselves  among  girders. 

The  annoyed  whistle  recurred.  By  now  the  charg- 
ing affair  had  lumbered  past,  was  still  threatening 
noisily,  but  was  two  furnaces  below.  I  stepped  back 
into  the  central  spaces  of  the  mill. 

The  foreman  had  told  me  to  see  the  melter,  Peter 
Grayson.  I  asked  a  short  Italian,  with  a  blazing  face 
and  weeping  eyes,  where  the  melter  was. 

He  stared  hostilely  at  me. 

"Pete  Grayson,"  I  said. 

"Oh,  Pete,"  he  returned;  "there!  " 

I  followed  his  eyes  past  a  pile  of  coal,  along  a  pipe, 
up  to  Pete.  He  was  a  Russian,  of  Atlas  build,  bent, 
vast-shouldered,  a  square  head  like  a  box.  He  was 
lounging  slowly  toward  me  with  short  steps.  Coming 
into  the  furnace  light,  I  could  see  he  was  an  old  man 
with  white  hair  under  his  cap,  and  a  wooden  face 
which,  I  was  certain,  kept  a  uniform  expression  in  all 
weathers. 

"What  does  a  third-helper  do?"  I  asked  when  he 
came  alongside. 

Pete  spat  and  turned  away,  as  if  the  question  dis- 
gusted him  profoundly.  But  I  noticed  in  a  moment 
that  he  was  giving  the  matter  thought. 

We  waited  two  minutes.  Finally  he  said,  looking  at 
me,  "Why  a  third-helper  has  got  a  hell  of  a  lot  to  do." 

He  seemed  to  regard  this  quantitative  answer  as 
entirely  satisfying. 

"I  know,"  I  said,  "but  what  in  hell  does  he  do?" 


io  STEEL 

He  again  looked  at  the  floor,  considered,  and  spat. 
"Reworks  around  the  furnace,"  he  said. 

I  saw  that  I  should  have  to  accept  this  as  a  pro- 
spectus. So  I  began  negotiations.  "I  want  a  job," 
I  said.  "I  come  from  Mr.  Towers.  Have  you  got 
anything  now?" 

He  looked  away  again  and  said,  "They  want  a  man 
on  the  night-shift.  Can  you  come  at  five?" 

My  heart  leaped  a  bit  at  "the  night-shift."  I 
thought  over  the  hours-schedule  the  employment 
manager  had  rehearsed:  "Five  to  seven,  fourteen 
hours,  on  the  night-week." 

"Yes,"  I  said. 

We  had  just  about  concluded  this  verbal  contract, 
when  a  chorus  of  "Heows"  hit  our  eardrums.  Men 
make  such  a  sound  in  a  queer,  startling,  warning  way, 
difficult  to  describe.  I  looked  around  for  the  charg- 
ing machine,  or  locomotive,  but  neither  was  in  range. 

"What  are  they  'Heowing'  about?"  I  thought 
violently  to  myself. 

But  Pete  had  already  grabbed  my  arm  with  a  hand 
like  a  crane-hook.  "Want  to  watch  y'self,"  he  said; 
"get  hurt." 

I  saw  what  it  was,  now :  the  overhead  crane,  about 
to  carry  over  our  heads  a  couple  of  tons  of  coal  in  a 
huge  swaying  box. 

I  looked  around  a  little  more  before  I  left,  trying  to 
organize  some  meaning  into  the  operations  I  observed; 
trying  to  wonder  how  it  would  be  to  take  a  shovel 
and  hurl  that  white  gravel  into  those  red  throats.  I 
said  to  myself:  "Hell!  I  guess  I  can  handle  it,"  and 


CAMP  EUSTIS  ii 

thought  strongly  on  the  worst  things  I  had  known  in 
the  army. 

As  I  stood,  a  locomotive  entered  the  mill  from  the 
other  end,  and  went  down  the  track  before  the 
furnaces.  It  was  dragging  flat-cars,  with  iron  boxes 
laid  crosswise  on  them,  as  big  as  coffins.  I  went  over 
and  looked  carefully  at  the  train  load,  and  at  one  or 
two  of  the  boxes.  They  were  filled  with  irregular 
shapes  of  iron,  wire  coils,  bars,  weights,  sheets,  frag- 
ments of  machines,  in  short  —  scrap. 

"This  is  what  they  eat,"  I  thought,  glancing  at  the 
glowing  doors;  "I  wonder  how  many  tons  a  day." 
I  waited  till  the  locomotive  came  to  a  shaken  stop  in 
front  of  the  middle  furnace,  then  left  the  mill  by  the 
tracks  along  which  it  had  entered. 

I  followed  them  out  and  along  a  short  bridge.  A 
little  way  to  my  right  was  solid  ground  —  the  yards, 
where  I  had  been.  Back  of  Mr.  Towers's  little  office 
were  more  mills.  I  picked  out  the  power  house  — 
half  a  city  block.  Behind  them  all  were  five  cone- 
shaped  towers,  against  the  sky,  and  a  little  smoke 
curling  over  the  top  —  the  blast-furnaces.  Behind 
me  the  Bessemer  furnace  threw  off  a  cloud  of  fire  that 
had  changed  while  I  was  in  the  mill  from  brown  to 
brownish  gold.  In  front,  and  to  my  left,  the  tracks 
ran  on  the  edge  of  a  sloping  embankment  that  fell 
away  quickly  to  a  lower  level.  Fifty  yards  from  the 
base  was  the  blooming-mill,  where  the  metal  was  be- 
ing rolled  into  great  oblong  shapes  called  "  blooms." 
A  vague  red  glow  came  out  of  its  interior  twilights. 

Down  through  the  railroad  ties  on  which  I  walked 


12  STEEL 

was  open  space,  twenty  feet  below.  Two  workmen 
were  coming  out  with  dinner-buckets.  It  must  be 
nearly  twelve.  I  had  a  curiosity  to  know  the  arrange- 
ment and  workings  of  the  dark  mill-cellar  from  which 
they  came. 

Turning  back  on  the  open-hearth  mill,  when  I  had 
crossed  the  bridge,  I  could  see  that  it  extended  itself, 
in  a  sort  of  gigantic  lean-to  shelter,  over  what  the 
melter  had  called  the  "pit."  There  was  a  crane  mov- 
ing about  there,  and  more  centres  of  light,  which  I 
took  to  be  molten  steel.  I  wondered  about  that  area, 
too,  and  what  sort  of  work  the  men  did. 

When  I  reached  the  end  of  the  track,  I  thought  to 
myself:  "I  go  to  work  at  five  o'clock.  How  about 
clothes?" 

No  one  in  the  mill  wore  overalls,  except  car- 
penters and  millwrights,  and  so  on.  The  helpers 
on  the  furnaces  were  clad  in  shapeless,  baggy,  gray 
affairs  for  trousers,  and  shirts  were  blue  or  gray,  with 
a  rare  khaki.  Hats  were  either  degraded  felts,  or  those 
black- visor  effects  —  like  locomotive  engineers. 

The  twelve-o'clock  whistle  blew.  A  few  men  had 
been  moving  toward  the  gate  slowly  for  minutes.  The 
whistle  sent  them  at  top  walking-speed.  I  stared  at 
them  to  assure  myself  as  to  the  correct  dress  for  steel 
makers. 

Main  Street  began  at  the  tracks,  and  ran  straight 
through  the  town,  mounting  the  hills  as  it  went.  At 
the  railroad  end  was  the  Hotel  Bouton,  where  I  had 
breakfasted.  Beside  it  was  an  Italian  fruit  store 


CAMP  EUSTIS  13 

sprawling  leisurely  over  the  sidewalk,  and  a  Greek 
restaurant,  one  of  four.  The  Greeks  monopolized  the 
feeding  of  Bouton.  A  block  farther,  on  the  right,  I 
ran  into  a  clothing-store,  a  barber-shop,  and  two 
rudimentary  department  stores.  Then,  on  the  same 
side,  a  finished  city  block,  looking  queer  and  haughty 
arnid  its  village  companions. 

" What's  that?"  I  asked  a  strolling,  raw-boned 
Slav. 

"Comp'ny  store,"  he  said. 

I  passed  a  one-story  movie  "palace,"  almost  con- 
cealed behind  chromatic  advertising,  and  then  the 
street  twisted  and  I  entered  the  "  American  quarter." 
Half  a  mile  of  neat,  slightly  varying  brick  houses,  with 
lawns  fifteen  by  twenty,  and  children  in  such  quantity 
as  seriously  to  menace  automobiles. 

I  looked  at  the  numbers  with  growing  interest,  to 
discover  in  which  I  should  go  to  bed  to-morrow  morn- 
ing at  7.30.  The  employment  manager  had  given  me 
the  number  343  to  try.  Here  it  was,  on  the  right, 
quite  like  the  others,  and,  I  guessed,  about  twenty 
minutes  from  the  mill.  Calculation  of  the  rising-times 
for  future  night-shifts  came  into  my  mind. 

I  was  shown  the  back  room  on  the  second  floor  —  a 
very  good  room,  with  a  big  bed,  and  two  windows. 

:' You  can  see  our  garden,"  said  Mrs.  Farrell  stand- 
ing at  one  of  the  windows. 

I  looked  out  and  found  the  most  intensively  culti- 
vated twenty-foot  plot  I  had  ever  seen  or  imagined. 
Behind  was  the  back  road  and  a  mud  cliff.  The  room 
seemed  a  little  extravagant  for  a  third-helper,  but  I 


14  STEEL 

took  it,  in  order  to  have  a  place  for  the  night,  and  con- 
tracted to  pay  four  dollars  a  week. 

I  walked  through  a  street  where  the  prices  of  cloth- 
ing were  moderate,  but  where  there  seemed  a  dearth  of 
second-hand  shops.  In  one  store  were  green  suits, 
belted,  and  hung  on  forms.  They  had  the  close-fitting 
waist,  and  were  marked,  "Style  Plus  Garments:  Our 
Special  Price,  315.00."  The  proprietor,  who  stood  in 
the  doorway,  to  be  handy  for  collaring  the  prospec- 
tive customer,  rushed  out  at  me,  hands  threatening. 
He  was  of  the  prevailing  racial  type. 

"Fix  you  up  wid  a  dandy  suit,"  he  said. 

"What  I  am  looking  for,"  I  said,  "is  something 
second-hand.  Do  you  have  any?"  I  shot  this  out 
partly  as  a  check. 

"Old  man  upstairs,  fix  you  up.  That  door." 

I  went  through  that  door  and  up  two  flights,  to  a 
room  containing  an  old  man,  a  sewing  machine,  and  a 
large  table  covered  with  old  clothing. 

"I  'm  looking  for  something  for  working-clothes," 
I  said;  "second-hand  coat  and  pants." 

He  lifted  a  number  from  the  tangled  mass  of  gar- 
ments, and  displayed  them.  They  appeared  to  me  too 
clean,  too  new,  too  dressy. 

"No,"  I  said,  "not  that." 

He  searched  again  and  came  up  with  a  highly 
respectable  blue  coat,  with  a  mere  raveling  on  one 
sleeve. 

"No,"  I  said,  "I '11  find  one." 

I  fished  very  deeply,  and  caught  some  green  pants, 


CAMP  EUSTIS  15 

evidently  "old"  and  spattered  with  white  paint  on 
the  knees.  He  hastened  to  point  out  the  white  paint. 

I  tried  to  explain  that  I  liked  a  little  white  paint  on 
my  clothes,  but  saw  I  was  unconvincing.  I  finally 
bought  the  suit  with  a  sort  of  violence  for  two  dollars, 
and  left  with  a  sense  of  fortunate  escape. 

Now  for  a  hat.  Two  blocks  down  the  street  I  found 
one,  somewhat  soiled  and  misshapen. 

"I  '11  take  that,"  I  said. 

The  clerk  lifted  it,  and,  when  I  was  fumbling  for 
money,  brushed  off  a  vast  portion  of  the  dirt,  and  re- 
shaped it  into  smooth,  luxuriant  curves.  But  still  I 
bought  the  hat. 

"At  any  rate,"  I  thought,  "I  can  restore  the  thing." 


II 

MOLTEN  STEEL  — AN  INITIATION 

AT  four  o'clock  I  put  on  my  paint-spattered  pants, 
the  coat  with  a  conspicuous  hole  near  one  of  the 
buttons,  and  my  green  hat.  I  climbed  the  little  hill 
before  the  gate,  among  leisurely  first  arrivals,  and 
found  myself  attracting  no  attention  whatsoever.  I  felt 
for  the  brass  check  in  my  shirt  pocket,  found  it, 
and  rebuttoned  the  pocket.  The  guard  peered  into  my 
face,  as  if  he  were  going  to  ask  for  a, pass,  but  did  n't. 

I  walked  the  four  hundred  yards  to  the  open-hearth, 
and  noticed  clearly  for  the  first  time  the  yard  of  the 
blooming-mill.  Here  varied  shapes  of  steel,  looking 
as  if  they  weighed  several  thousand  pounds  each, 
were  issuing  from  the  mill  on  continuous  treads,  and 
moving  about  the  yard  in  a  most  orderly,  but  com- 
plex manner.  Electric  cranes  were  sweeping  over  the 
quarter-acre  of  yard-space,  and  lifting  and  piling  the 
steel  swiftly  and  precisely  on  flat  cars. 

I  entered  the  open-hearth  mill  by  the  tracks  that 
ran  close  to  the  furnaces.  The  mill  noises  broke  on 
me:  a  moan  and  rattle  of  cranes  overhead,  fifty- ton 
ones;  the  jarring  of  the  train-loads  of  charge-boxes 
stopping  suddenly  in  front  of  Number  4;  and  minor 
sounds  like  chains  jangling  on  being  dropped,  or 
gravel  swishing  out  of  a  box.  I  was  conscious  of 


MOLTEN  STEEL  — AN   INITIATION        17 

muscles  growing  tense  in  the  face  of  this  violent  en- 
vironment, a  somewhat  artificial  and  eager  calm.  I 
walked  with  excessive  firmness,  and  felt  my  person- 
ality contracting  itself  into  the  mere  sense  of  sight 
and  sound. 

I  looked  for  Pete. 

"He's  in  his  shanty — over  there,  "said  an  American 
furnace-helper,  who  was  getting  into  his  mill  clothes. 

I  went  after  Pete's  shanty.  It  was  a  sheet-iron  box, 
12  by  12,  midway  down  the  floor,  near  a  steel  beam. 
Pete  was  coming  out,  buttoning  the  lower  buttons  of  a 
blue  shirt.  He  looked  through  my  head  and  passed 
me,  much  as  he  had  passed  the  steel  beam.  With  two 
or  three  steps  I  moved  out  and  blocked  his  way.  He 
looked  at  me,  loosened  his  face,  and  said  very  cheer- 
fully: "Hello." 

"I  've  come  to  work,"  I  said. 

"Here,"  he  said,  "you  '11  work  th'  pit  t'  night.  Few 
days,  y'  know,  get  used  ter  things." 

He  led  the  way  to  some  iron  stairs,  and  we  went 
down  together  into  that  darkened  region  under  the 
furnaces,  about  whose  function  I  had  speculated. 

To  the  left  I  could  make  out  tracks.  Railroads 
seem  to  run  through  a  steel  mill  from  cellar  to  attic. 
And  at  intervals,  from  above  the  tracks,  torrents  of 
sparks  swept  into  the  dark,  with  now  and  then  a  small 
stream  of  yellow  fire. 

We  stumbled  over  bricks,  mud,  clay,  a  shovel,  and 
the  railroad  track.  In  front  of  a  narrow  curtain  of 
molten  slag,  falling  on  the  floor,  we  waited  for  some 
moments.  We  were  under  the  middle  furnaces,  I 


i8  STEEL 

calculated.  Gradually  the  curtain  ceased,  and  Pete 
leaped  under  the  hole  from  which  it  had  come. 

"Watch  yourself,"  he  said. 

I  followed  him  with  a  broad  jump,  and  a  prayer 
about  the  falling  slag. 

We  came  out  into  the  pit,  which  had  so  many  bright 
centres  of  molten  steel  that  it  was  lighter  than  out- 
doors. I  watched  Pete's  back  chiefly,  and  my  own  feet. 
We  kept  stepping  between  little  chunks  of  dark  slag, 
which  made  your  feet  hot,  and  close  to  a  bucket,  ten 
feet  high,  which  gave  forth  smoke.  Wheelbarrows 
we  met,  with  and  without  men,  and  metal  boxes,  as 
large  as  wagons,  dropped  about  a  dirt  floor.  We 
avoided  a  hole  with  a  fire  at  its  centre. 

At  last,  at  the  edge  of  the  pit,  near  more  tracks,  we 
ran  into  the  pit  gang:  eight  or  ten  men,  leaning  on 
shovels  and  forks  and  blinking  at  the  molten  metal 
falling  into  a  huge  bucket-like  ladle. 

:<Y'  work  here"  said  Pete,  and  moved  on. 

I  remember  feeling  a  half-pleasurable  glow  as  I 
looked  about  the  strenuous  environment,  of  which  I 
was  to  become  a  part  —  a  glow  mixed  with  a  touch  of 
anxiety  as  to  what  I  was  up  against  for  the  next 
fourteen  hours. 

Two  of  the  eight  men  looked  at  me,  and  grinned. 
I  grinned  back  and  put  on  my  gloves. 

"No.  6  furnace?"  I  asked,  nodding  toward  the 
stream. 

"Ye-ah,"  said  the  man  next  me. 

He  was  a  cleanly  built  person,  in  loose  corduroy 
pants,  blue  shirt  open  at  his  neck.  Italian. 


MOLTEN  STEEL— AN  INITIATION        19 

He  grinned  with  extraordinary  friendliness,  and 
said,  "First  night,  this  place?" 

"Yes,"  I  returned. 

"Goddam  hell  of  a job,"  he  said,  very  genially. 

We  both  turned  to  look  at  the  stream  again. 

For  ten  minutes  we  stood  and  stared.  Two  men  lit 
cigarettes,  and  sat  on  a  wheelbarrow;  four  of  the 
others  had  nodded  to  me;  the  other  three  stared. 

I  was  eager  to  organize  into  reasonableness  a  little 
of  this  strenuous  process  that  was  going  forward  with 
a  hiss  and  a  roar  about  me. 

"That's  the  ladle?  "  I  said,  to  start  things. 

:<Ye-ah,  w'ere  yer  see  metal  come,  dat's  spout, 
crane  tak'  him  over  pour  platform,  see;  pour  man 
mak  li'l  hole  in  ladle,  fill  up  moul'  —  see  de  moul' 
on  de  flat  cars?  " 

The  Italian  was  a  professor  to  me.  I  got  the  place 
named  and  charted  in  good  shape  before  the  night  was 
out.  The  pit  was  an  area  of  perhaps  half  an  acre,  with 
open  sides  and  a  roof.  Two  cranes  traversed  its  entire 
extent,  and  a  railway  passed  through  its  outer  edge, 
bearing  mammoth  moulds,  seven  feet  high  above  their 
flat  cars.  Every  furnace  protruded  a  spout,  and,  when 
the  molten  steel  inside  was  "cooked,"  tilted  back- 
ward slightly  and  poured  into  a  ladle.  A  bunch  of 
things  happened  before  that  pouring.  Men  appeared 
on  a  narrow  platform  with  a  very  twisted  railing,  near 
the  spout,  and  worked  for  a  time  with  rods.  They 
prodded  up  inside,  till  a  tiny  stream  of  fire  broke 
through.  Then  you  could  see  them  start  back  in  the 
nick  of  time  to  escape  the  deluge  of  molten  steel.  The 


20  STEEL 

stream  in  the  spout  would  swell  to  the  circumference  of 
a  man's  body,  and  fall  into  the  ladle,  that  oversized 
bucket  thing,  hung  conveniently  for  it  by  the  electric 
crane.  A  dizzy  tide  of  sparks  accompanied  the  stream, 
and  shot  out  quite  far  into  the  pit,  at  times  causing 
men  to  slap  themselves  to  keep  their  clothing  from 
breaking  out  into  a  blaze.  There  were  always  staccato 
human  voices  against  the  mechanical  noise,  and  you 
distinguished  by  inflection,  whether  you  heard  com- 
mand, or  assent,  or  warning,  or  simply  the  lubrica- 
tions of  profanity. 

As  the  molten  stuff  rose  toward  the  top  of  the  ladle, 
curdling  like  a  gigantic  pot  of  oatmeal,  somebody 
gave  a  yell,  and  slowly,  by  an  entirely  concealed 
power,  the  250-ton  furnace  lifted  itself  erect,  and  the 
steel  stopped  flowing  down  the  spout. 

But  it  splashed  and  slobbered  enormously  in  the 
ladle  at  this  juncture;  a  few  hundred  pounds  ran  over 
the  edge  to  the  floor  of  the  pit.  This,  when  it  had 
cooled  a  little,  it  would  be  our  job  to  clean  up,  sepa- 
rating steel  scrap  from  the  slag,  and  putting  it  into 
boxes  for  remelting. 

When  a  ladle  was  full,  the  crane  took  it  gingerly  in 
a  sweep  of  a  hundred  feet  through  mid-air,  and,  as 
Fritz  said,  the  men  on  the  pouring  platform  released 
a  stopper  from  a  hole  in  the  bottom,  to  let  out  the 
steel.  It  flowed  out  in  a  spurting  stream  three  or  four 
inches  thick,  into  moulds  that  stood  some  seven  feet 
high  on  flat  cars. 

"  Clean  off  the  track  on  Number  7,  an'  make  it  fast," 
from  the  pit  boss,  accompanied  by  a  neat  stream  of 


MOLTEN  STEEL— AN   INITIATION        21 

tobacco  juice,  which  began  to  steam  vigorously  when 
it  struck  the  hot  slag  at  his  feet. 

We  passed  through  to  the  other  side  of  the  furnaces, 
by  going  under  Number  6,  a  bright  fall  of  sparks  from 
the  slag-hole  just  missing  the  heels  of  the  last  man. 

"Is  n't  that  dangerous  and  unnecessary?"  I  said 
to  myself,  angrily.  "  Why  do  we  have  to  dodge  under 
that  slag-hole?" 

We  moved  in  the  dark  along  a  track  that  turned  in 
under  Seven,  into  a  region  of  great  heat.  Before  us 
was  a  small  hill  of  partially  cooled  slag,  blocking  the 
track.  It  was  like  a  tiny  volcano,  actively  fluid  in  the 
centre,  with  the  edges  blackened  and  hard. 

I  found  out  very  quickly  the  why  of  this  mess.  The 
furnace  is  made  to  rock  forward,  and  spill  out  a  few 
hundred  pounds  of  the  slag  that  floats  on  top.  A  short 
"buggy"  car  runs  under,  to  catch  the  flow.  But  some- 
body had  blundered  —  no  buggy  was  there  when  the 
slag  came. 

"Get  him  up  queek,  and  let  buggy  come  back  for 
nex'  time,"  explained  an  Italian  with  moustachios, 
who  carried  the  pick.  "Huh,  whatze  matter  goddam 
first-helper,  letta  furnace  go?"  he  added  angrily. 
"Lotza  work." 

This  job  took  us  three  hours.  The  Italian  went  in 
at  once  with  the  pick,  and  loosened  a  mass  of  cinder 
near  one  of  the  rails.  Fritz  and  I  followed  up  with 
shovels,  hurling  the  stuff  away  from  the  tracks. 

The  slag  is  light,  and  you  can  swing  a  fat  shovelful 
with  ease;  but  mixed  with  it  are  clumps  of  steel  that 
follow  the  slag  over  the  furnace  doors.  It  grew  hotter 


22  STEEL 

as  we  worked  in  —  three  inches  of  red  heat,  to  a  slag 
cake  six  inches  thick. 

"Hose,"  said  someone.  The  Italian  found  it  in 
back  of  the  next  furnace,  and  screwed  it  to  a  spigot 
between  the  two.  We  became  drowned  in  steam. 

We  had  been  at  it  about  an  hour  and  a  half,  and  I 
was  shoveling  back  loose  cinder,  with  a  little  speed  to 
get  it  over  with.  "  Rest  yourself,"  commanded  Mous- 
tachios.  "Lotza  time,  lotza  time." 

I  leaned  on  my  shovel  and  found  rather  mixed 
feelings  rising  inside  me.  I  was  a  little  resentful  at 
being  told  what  to  do;  a  little  pleased  that  I  was  up, 
at  least,  to  the  gang  standard;  a  little  in  doubt  as 
to  whether  we  ought  not  to  be  working  harder;  but, 
on  the  whole,  tired  enough  to  dismiss  the  question 
and  lean  on  my  shovel. 

The  heat  was  bad  at  times  (from  120  to  130  de- 
grees when  you're  right  in  it,  I  should  guess).  It  was 
like  constantly  sticking  your  head  into  the  fireplace. 
When  you  had  a  cake  or  two  of  newly  turned  slag, 
glowing  on  both  sides,  you  worked  like  hell  to  get 
your  pick  work  done  and  come  out.  I  found  a  given 
amount  of  work  in  heat  fatigued  at  three  times  the 
rate  of  the  same  work  in  a  cooler  atmosphere.  But  it 
was  exciting,  at  all  events,  and  preferable  to  mo- 
notony. 

We  used  the  crowbar  and  sledge  on  the  harder 
ledges  of  the  stuff,  putting  a  loose  piece  under  the  bar 
and  prying. 

When  it  was  well  cleared,  a  puffy  switch-engine 
came  out  of  the  dark  from  the  direction  of  Number  4, 


MOLTEN  STEEL— AN  INITIATION        23 

and  pushed  a  buggy  under  the  furnace.  The  engineer 
was  short  and  jolly-looking,  and  asked  the  Italians  a 
few  very  personal  questions  in  a  loud  ringing  voice. 
Everyone  laughed,  and  all  but  Fritz  and  I  undertook 
a  new  cheekful  of  "Honest  Scrap."  I  smoked  a  Camel 
and  gave  Fritz  one. 

Then  Al,  the  pit  boss,  came  through.  He  was  an 
American,  medium  husky,  cap  on  one  ear,  and  spat 
through  his  teeth.  I  guessed  that  Al  somehow  was  n't 
as  hard-boiled  as  he  looked,  and  found  later  that  he 
was  new  as  a  boss.  I  concluded  that  he  adopted  this 
exterior  in  imitation  of  bosses  of  greater  natural  gifts 
in  those  lines,  and  to  give  substance  to  his  authority. 
He  used  to  be  a  workman  in  the  tin  mill. 

"All  done?  If  the  son  of  a of  a  first-helper 

on  the  furnace  had  any  brains  .  .  ."  and  so  forth. 
"Now  get  through  and  clean  out  the  goddam  mess  in 
front." 

We  went  through,  and  Fritz  used  the  pick  against 
some  very  dusty  cinder  that  was  entirely  cool,  and 
was  massed  in  great  piles  on  the  front  side  of  the 
slag-hole. 

"Getta  wheelbarrow,  you" 

I  started  for  the  wheelbarrow,  just  the  ghost  of  a 
resentment  rising  at  being  "ordered  about"  by  a 
"Wop"  and  then  fading  out  into  the  difficulties  I  had 
in  finding  the  wheelbarrow.  Two  or  three  things  that 
day  I  had  been  sent  for  —  things  whose  whereabouts 
were  a  closed  book.  "Where  the  devil,"  I  muttered  to 
myself,  violently  disturbed,  "are  wheelbarrows?"  I 
found  one,  at  last,  near  the  masons  under  Number  4, 
and  started  off. 


24  STEEL 

"Hey,  what  the  hell?  what  the  hell?" 

So  much  for  that  wheelbarrow. 

I  found  another,  behind  a  box,  near  Number  8, 
and  pushed  it  back  over  mud,  slag,  scrap,  and  pipes 
and  things.  I  never  knew  before  what  a  bother  a 
wheelbarrow  is  on  an  open-hearth  pit  floor.  Only  four 
of  us  stayed  for  work  under  Number  7,  a  German 
laborer  and  I  cooperating  with  shovel  and  wheel- 
barrow on  the  right-hand  cinder  pile. 

We  had  been  digging  and  hauling  an  hour,  and  it 
was  necessary  to  reach  underneath  the  slag-hole  to 
get  at  what  was  left.  I  always  glanced  upward  for 
sparks  and  slag  when  shoveling,  and  allowed  only  my 
right  hand  and  shovel  to  pass  under.  Just  as  arm  and 
shovel  went  in  for  a  new  lot  Fritz  yelled,  "Watch 
out!"  I  pulled  back  with  a  frog's  leap,  and  dodged  a 
shaft  of  fat  sparks,  spattering  on  the  pit  floor.  A 
second  later,  the  sparks  became  a  tiny  stream,  the 
size  of  a  finger,  and  then  a  torrent  of  molten  slag,  the 
size  of  an  arm.  The  stuif  bounded  and  splashed  vigor- 
ously when  it  struck  the  ground. 

It  did  n't  get  us,  and  in  a  second  we  both  laughed 
from  a  safe  distance. 

"Goddam  slag  come  queek,"  said  Fritz,  grinning. 
"How  you  like  job?"  he  added. 

Before  I  had  any  chance  to  discuss  the  nuances  of  a 
clean-up's  walk  in  life,  Fritz  was  pointing  out  a  new 
source  of  molten  danger. 

We  were  standing  now  in  the  main  pit,  beyond  the 
overhanging  edge  of  the  furnace. 

"Look  out  now,  zee!"  said  Fritz,  pointing  upward. 


MOLTEN  STEEL— AN   INITIATION        25 

Almost  over  our  head  was  Number  7's  spout,  and, 
dribbling  off  the  end,  another  small  rope  of  sparks. 

We  fell  over  each  other  to  the  pit's  edge,  stopping 
when  we  reached  tracks.  Looking  back  at  once,  we 
saw  that  the  stream  had  thickened  like  the  other  in 
the  slag-hole.  But  here  it  was  molten  steel,  and  with 
a  long  drop  of  thirty  feet.  The  rebound  of  the  thud- 
ding molten  metal  sent  it  off  twenty-five  or  thirty 
feet  in  all  directions.  Three  different  groups  of  men 
were  backing  off  toward  the  edge  of  the  pit. 

The  stream  swelled  steadily  till  it  reached  the  cir- 
cumference of  a  man's  body,  and  fell  in  a  thudding 
shaft  of  metallic  flame  to  the  pit's  floor.  Spatterings 
went  out  in  a  moderately  symmetrical  circle  forty 
feet  across.  The  smaller  gobs  of  molten  stuff  made 
minor  centres  of  spatter  of  their  own.  It  was  a  spec- 
tacle that  burned  easily  into  memory. 

The  gang  of  men  at  the  edge  of  the  pit  watched  the 
thing  with  apparent  enjoyment.  I  wondered  slowly 
two  things:  one,  whether  anyone  ever  got  caught 
under  such  a  molten  Niagara,  and  two,  whether 
the  pit  was  going  to  have  a  steel  floor  before  it  could 
be  stopped.  How  could  it  be  stopped,  anyway? 

The  craneman  had  been  busy  for  some  minutes 
picking  up  a  ladle  from  Number  4,  and  at  that  instant 
he  swung  it  under,  and  the  process  of  steel-flooring 
ceased.1 

What  the  devil  had  happened  ?  I  talked  with  every- 
body I  could  as  they  broke  up  at  the  pit's  edge.  It 

1 1  learned  later  the  flow  could  have  been  stopped  by  simply  tilting  back  the. 
furnace,  but  the  craneman  was  ready  and  so  brought  the  ladle  up. 


26  STEEL 

was  a  rare  thing  I  learned:  the  mud  and  dolomite 
(a  limestone  substance)  in  the  tap-hole  had  not  been 
properly  packed,  and  broke  through.  My  compan- 
ions told  me  about  another  occasion,  some  years 
before,  when  molten  steel  got  loose.  It  happened  on 
the  Bessemer  furnaces,  and  the  workers  had  n't 
either  the  luck  or  agility  of  ourselves.  It  caught 
twenty-four  men  in  the  flow  —  killed  and  buried 
them.  The  company,  with  a  sense  of  the  proprieties, 
waited  until  the  families  of  the  men  moved  before 
putting  the  scrap,  which  contained  them,  back  into 
the  furnace  for  remelting. 

As  I  ate  three  bowls  of  oatmeal  at  the  Greek's,  at 
7.15,  I  thought,  "Those  fellows  do  these  shifts,  year 
after  year.  What  does  the  heat,  and  the  danger,  and 
the  work  do  to  them?  Maybe  they  'get  used  to'  the 
whole  business.  Will  I?" 

I  went  to  bed  at  8.05,  and  all  impressions  faded 
from  consciousness,  except  weariness,  and  lame  arms, 
and  a  burn  on  each  ankle. 

After  two  or  three  days  in  the  pit,  I  began  to  know 
the  gang  a  little  by  name  and  character.  There  was 
Marco,  a  young  Croat  of  twenty-four,  who  had  start- 
ed to  teach  me  Croatian  in  return  for  some  necessary 
American;  Fritz,  a  German  with  the  Wanderlust; 
Adam,  an  aristocratic  person,  very  mature,  and  with 
branching  moustachios;  Peter,  a  Russian  of  infinite 
good-nature;  and  a  quiet-eyed  Pole,  who  was  saving 
up  two  hundred  dollars  to  go  to  the  old  country. 


MOLTEN  STEEL— AN  INITIATION        27 

For  several  days  it  was  impossible  to  break  into 
Adam's  circle  of  friends;  he  would  talk  and  work  only 
with  veteran  clean-ups,  and  showed  immense  pom- 
posity in  a  knowing  way  of  hooking  up  slag  and  scrap 
to  the  crane.  One  day,  however,  I  found  him  work- 
ing alone  with  a  wheelbarrow,  cleaning  cinder  from 
around  a  buggy  car  under  furnace  No.  8.  He  looked 
over  at  me  as  I  passed,  and  yelled:  "Hey,  you!" 

He  wanted  my  assistance  on  the  wheelbarrow.  We 
worked  together  for  an  hour  or  so,  and'  I  felt  that 
perhaps  the  ice  was  broken. 

"Did  you  ever  work  on  the  floor?"  I  asked. 

:<Two  years,"  he  said;  "no  good." 

A  little  later  I  talked  to  Marco  about  him. 

"Hell,"  he  said,  "he  got  fired  from  furnace,  for  too 
goddam  lazy."  I  felt  less  hurt  at  his  snobbishness 
after  that. 

Marco  and  I  became  good  chums.  We  sat  on  a 
wheelbarrow  one  day,  after  finishing  a  job  on  the 
track  under  Six. 

^You  teach  me  American,"  he  said;  "I  teach  you 
'"Croatian." 

"Damn  right,"  I  said;  and  we  began  on  the  parts 
of  our  body,  and  the  clothing  we  wore,  drawing  out 
some  of  the  words  in  the  dirt  with  a  stick,  or  mark- 
ing them  with  charcoal  on  a  board. 

"Did  you  ever  go  to  school  in  America?"  I  asked. 

*  Three    month,    night    school,    Pittsburgh.     Too 
much,  work  all  day,  twelve  hour,  go  to  school  night,3 
he  said. 


28  STEEL 

"Do  you  save  any  money?  Got  any  in  the  bank?" 
I  asked,  feeling  a  little  fatherly,  and  wondering  on 
the  state  of  his  economic  virtues. 

"Hell,  no,"  he  said;  "I  don'  want  money  in  bank, 
jes  nuff  get  along  on." 

I  talked  to  a  good  many  on  the  savings  question, 
and  found  the  young  men  very  often  did  n't  save,  but 
"  bummed  round,"  while  practically  all  the  "  Hunkies  " 
of  twenty-eight  or  thirty  and  over  saved  very  success- 
fully. A  German  who  put  scrap  in  the  charge-boxes, 
after  the  magnet  had  dropped  it,  had  saved  34000  and 
invested  it.  One  man  said  to  me:  "A  good  job,  save 
money,  work  all  time,  go  home,  sleep,  no  spend." 
Speaking  of  the  German,  "He  no  drink,  no  spend." 
The  savers,  I  think,  are  apt  to  be  the  single  men  who 
return  to  their  own  country  in  ten  or  fifteen  years. 

I  came  out  of  the  mill  one  morning  after  a  night- 
shift,  with  an  appetite  that  made  me  run  from  the  rail- 
road bridge  to  Main  Street.  I  went  to  the  Hotel 
Bouton,  where  the  second-helper  on  Eight  usually 
eats,  and  started  at  the  beginning,  with  pears.  I  ate 
the  cereal,  eggs,  potatoes,  toast,  coffee,  and  griddle- 
cakes,  taking  seconds  and  thirds  when  I  could  nego- 
tiate them  —  the  Bouton  is  stingy  under  a  new  man- 
agement, probably  finding  that  steel-workers  eat  up 
the  profit.  I  got  up  from  the  table  feeling  as  hungry 
as  when  I  sat  down,  and  went  to  the  restaurant  just 
two  doors  below  —  unpalatable,  but  serving  fairly 
large  portions.  There  I  had  another  breakfast:  coffee, 
oatmeal,  eggs.  I  felt  decidedly  better  after  that,  and 
started  home  in  good  humor.  But  by  the  time  I 


MOLTEN  STEEL— AN   INITIATION        29 

reached  the  window  of  Tom,  the  Wiener  man,  I  felt 
that  there  was  room  for  improvement,  and  looked  in 
my  pocketbook  to  see  if  I  had  any  breakfast  money 
left.  I  had  n't  a  cent,  but  there  were  quantities  of 
two-cent  stamps.  I  went  in  and  sat  down  at  Tom's 
counter,  where  I  ate  a  bowl  of  cereal  and  a  glass  of 
milk.  Then  I  opened  my  purse.  In  a  moment  or  two 
I  convinced  Tom  that  two-cent  stamps  were  good 
legal  tender,  and  went  home. 


Ill 

THE  OPEN-HEARTH  —  NIGHT-SHIFTS 

"HAVE  a  cigarette,  Pete,"  I  said,  offering  a  Camel 
to  a  very  fat  and  boyish-looking  Russian. 

"No  t'ank." 

"What,  no  smoke?"   I  asked,  incredulous. 

"No,  no  smoke." 

"No  drink?"  I  asked,  wondering  if  I  had  found  a 
Puritan. 

"Oh,  drink"  he  said  with  profound  emphasis;  and 
continuing,  he  told  me  of  other  solaces  he  found  in 
this  mortal  life. 

"Look!"  cried  some  one. 

Herb,  the  craneman,  in  a  fit  of  extreme  playfulness 
had  thrown  some  wet  green  paint  forty  feet  through 
the  air  at  the  pit  boss,  greening  the  whole  side  of  his 
face.  Al  was  doing  a  long  backward  dodge,  and  slap- 
ping a  hand  to  his  painted  face,  supposing  it  a  draught 
of  hot  metal.  When  he  perceived  that  he  was  n't 
killed,  he  picked  up  cinder-hunks  and  bombarded  the 
crane-box.  It  sounded  like  hail  on  tin. 

Pete,  the  Russian  melter,  came  out  on  the  gallery 
behind  the  furnaces,  and  I  could  see  by  the  way  he 
looked  the  pit  over,  that  he  was  picking  a  man  for 
furnace  work.  Somebody  had  stayed  out  and  they 
were  short  a  helper.  He  looked  at  the  fat  workman 
beside  me,  and  then  grunted. 


THE  OPEN-HEARTH  31 

This  was  the  third  time  he  had  picked  Russians  in 
preference  to  the  rest  of  us,  who  are  Serbian,  Austrian, 
and  American. 

The  next  day  I  went  on  the  floor,  and  tackled  Pete. 

"How  about  a  chance  on  the  floor?"  I  said,  stand- 
ing in  front  of  him  to  keep  him  from  lurching  away. 
CY'  get  chance  'miff,  don'  worry." 

"If  I  can't  get  a  crack  at  learning  this  game  in 
Bouton,  I  '11  go  somewhere  I  can,"  I  said,  boiling  up 
a  little. 

Dick  Reber,  the  Pennsylvania-Dutch  melter,  came 
up. 

"I  want  a  chance  on  the  floor,"  I  said. 

"All  right,  boy,  go  on  Number  7  to-day." 

I  made  all  speed  to  Number  7.  "Is  he  doing  that," 
I  thought,  as  I  picked  up  my  shovel,  "because  I'm 
an  American? " 

I  looked  up  and  saw  the  big  ladle-bucket  pouring 
hot  metal  into  a  spout  in  the  furnace-door,  accom- 
panied by  a  great  swirl  of  sparks  and  flame,  spurting 
upward  with  a  sizzle. 

"At  last,"  I  said,  "I  'm  going  to  make  steel." 

The  steel  starts  in  as  "scrap"  in  the  mill-yard. 
Scrap  from  anywhere  in  America;  a  broken  casting, 
the  size  of  a  man's  trunk,  down  to  corroded  pipe,  or 
strips  the  thickness  of  your  nail,  salvaged  in  bales. 
The  overhead  crane  gathers  them  all  from  arriving 
flat  cars  by  a  magnet  as  big  as  a  cart  wheel,  and  the 
pieces  of  steel  leap  to  meet  it  with  apparent  joy,  stick 
stoutly  for  a  moment,  and  fall  released  into  iron 


32  STEEL 

charge-boxes.  By  trainloads  they  pass  out  of  the  stock- 
yard and  into  the  mill,  where  the  track  runs  directly 
in  front  of  the  furnace-doors.  There  the  charging- 
machine  dumps  them  quickly  into  the  belly  of  the 
furnace.  It  does  its  work  with  a  single  iron  finger, 
about  ten  feet  long  and  nearly  a  foot  thick,  lifting 
the  box  by  a  cleat  on  the  end,  and  poking  it  swiftly 
into  the  flaming  door.  Old  furnaces  charged  by  hand 
hold  from  twenty-five  to  thirty-five  tons;  new  ones, 
up  to  two  hundred  and  fifty. 

That  is  the  first  step  in  starting  to  make  a  "heat," 
which  means  cook  a  bellyful  to  the  proper  temper- 
ature for  steel,  ready  to  tap  into  a  ladle  for  ingot- 
making.  Next  comes  "making  front-wall,"  which  signi- 
fies that  no  self-respecting  brick,  clay,  or  any  other 
substance,  can  stand  a  load  of  metal  up  to  steel-heat 
without  being  temporarily  relined  right  away  for  the 
next  draft  of  flame.  We  do  that  relining  by  shovel- 
ing dolomite  into  the  furnace.  The  official  known  as 
second-helper  wields  a  Brobdingnag  spoon,  about 
two  inches  larger  than  a  dinner-plate  and  fifteen  feet 
long,  which  a  couple  of  third-helpers,  among  them 
myself,  fill  with  dolomite.  By  use  of  the  spoon,  he 
carefully  spreads  the  protection  over  the  front-wall. 

But  the  sporting  job  on  the  open-hearth  comes  a 
bit  later,  and  consists  in  "making  back-wall."  Then 
all  the  men  on  the  furnace  and  all  the  men  on  your 
neighbor's  furnace  form  a  dolomite  line,  and  march- 
ing in  file  to  the  open  door,  fling  their  shovelfuls 
across  the  flaming  void  to  the  back-wall.  It's  not 
a  beginner's  job.  You  must  swing  your  weapon 


THE  OPEN-HEARTH  33 , 

through  a  wide  arc,  to  give  it  "wing,"  and  the  stuff 
must  hop  off  just  behind  the  furnace-door  and  rise 
high  enough  to  top  the  scrap  between,  and  land  high. 
I  say  it's  not  a  beginner's  job,  though  it 's  like  golf  — 
the  first  shovelful  may  be  a  winner.  What  lends  life 
to  the  sport  is  the  fact  that  everybody  Js  in  it  — 
it's  the  team  play  of  the  open-hearth,  like  a  house- 
raising  in  the  community. 

Another  thing  giving  life  is  the  heat.  The  mouth  of 
the  furnace  gapes  it  widest,  and  you  must  hug  close 
in  order  to  get  the  stuff  across.  Every  man  has  deeply 
smoked  glasses  on  his  nose  when  he  faces  the  furnace. 
He's  got  to  stare  down  her  throat,  to  watch  where  the 
dolomite  lands.  It's  up  to  him  to  place  his  stuff  — 
the  line  is  n't  marching  through  the  heat  to  warm  its 
hands.  Here's  a  tip  I  didn't  "savvy"  on  my  first 
back-wall.  Throw  your  left  arm  high  at  the  end  of 
your  arc,  and  in  front  of  your  face;  it  will  cut  the  heat 
an  instant,  and  allow  you  to  see  if  you  have  "placed" 
without  flinching.  It's  really  not  brawn,  —  making 
back-wall,  —  but  a  nimble  swing  and  a  good  eye, 
and  the  art  of  not  minding  heat. 

After  that  is  done,  she  can  cook  for  a  while  and 
needs  only  watching.  The  first-helper  gives  her  that, 
passing  up  and  down  every  few  minutes  to  look 
through  the  peepholes  in  her  furnace-doors.  He  puts 
his  glasses  down  on  his  nose,  inspects  the  brew,  and 
notices  if  her  stomach's  in  good  shape.  If  the  bricks 
get  as  red  as  the  gas  flame,  she's  burning  the  living 
lining  out  of  her.  But  he  keeps  the  gas  blowing  in  her 
ends,  as  hot  as  she'll  stand  it  without  a  holler.  On 


34  STEEL 

either  end  the  gas,  and  on  top  of  it  the  air.  The  first- 
helper,  who  is  cook  of  the  furnace,  makes  a  proper 
mixture  out  of  them.  The  hotter  he  can  let  the  gas 
through,  the  quicker  the  brew  is  cooked,  and  the  more 
"tonnage"  he'll  make  that  week. 

"Get  me  thirty  thousand  pounds,"  said  the  first- 
helper  when  I  was  on  the  furnace  that  first  night. 
Fifteen  tons  of  molten  metal!  I  was  undecided 
whether  to  bring  it  in  a  dipper  or  in  my  hat.  But  it 's 
no  more  than  running  upstairs  for  a  handkerchief  in 
the  bureau.  You  climb  to  a  platform  near  the  blower, 
where  the  stuif  is  made,  and  find  a  man  there  with  a 
book.  Punch  him  in  the  arm  and  say,  "Thirty  thou' 
for  Number  7. "  He  will  swear  moderately  and  blow 
a  whistle.  You  return  to  the  furnace,  and  on  your 
heels  follows  a  locomotive  dragging  a  bucket,  the  ladle, 
ten  feet  high.  Out  of  it  arise  the  fumes  of  your  fifteen 
tons  of  hot  metal.  The  overhead  crane  picks  it  up  and 
pours  it  through  a  spout  into  the  furnace.  As  it  goes 
in,  you  stand  and  direct  the  pouring.  The  craneman, 
as  he  tilts  or  raises  the  bucket,  watches  you  for  direc- 
tions, and  you  stand  and  make  gentle  motions  with 
one  hand,  thus  easily  and  simply  controlling  the  flux 
of  the  fifteen  tons.  That  part  of  the  job  always 
pleased  me.  It  was  like  modeling  Niagara  with  a 
wave  of  the  hand.  Sometimes  he  spills  a  little,  and 
there  is  a  vortex  of  sparks,  and  much  molten  metal 
in  front  of  the  door  to  step  on. 

She  cooks  in  anywhere  from  ten  hours  to  twenty- 
four.  The  record  on  this  floor  is  ten,  which  was  put 


THE  OPEN-HEARTH  35 

over  by  Jock.  He  has  worked  on  most  of  the  open- 
hearths,  I  learn,  from  Scotland  to  Colorado. 

When  it's  time  for  a  test,  the  first-helper  will  take  a 
spoon  about  the  size  of  your  hand  and  scoop  up  some 
of  the  soup.  But  not  to  taste.  He  pours  it  into  a 
mould,  and  when  the  little  ingot  is  cool,  breaks  it  with 
a  sledge.  Everyone  on  the  furnace,  barring  myself, 
looks  at  the  broken  metal  and  gives  a  wise  smile.  I  'm 
not  enough  of  a  cook.  They  know  by  the  grain  if  she 
has  too  much  carbon  or  needs  more,  or  is  ready  to 
tap,  or  is  n't.  With  too  much  carbon,  she  '11  need  a 
"jigger,"  which  is  a  few  more  tons  of  hot  metal,  to 
thin  her  out. 

That 's  about  the  whole  game  —  abbreviated  —  up 
to  tap-time.  It  takes,  on  an  average,  eighteen  hours, 
and  your  shift  may  be  anything  from  ten  to  twenty- 
four.  Of  course,  there  are  details,  like  shoveling  in 
fluor-spar  to  thin  out  the  slag.  Be  sure  you  clear  the 
breast  of  the  furnace,  with  your  shovelful,  when  you 
put  that  into  her.  Spar  eats  the  dolomite  as  mice  eat 
cheese. 

At  intervals  the  first-helper  tilts  the  whole  furnace 
forward,  and  she  runs  out  at  the  doors,  which  is  to 
drain  off  the  slag  that  floats  on  top  of  the  brew.  But 
after  much  weariness  it's  tap-time  and  the  "big  boss" 
comes  to  supervise. 

Move  aside  the  shutters  covering  the  round  peep- 
holes on  her  doors,  at  this  time,  and  you  '11  see  the 
brew  bubbling  away  like  malt  breakfast-food  ready  to 
eat.  But  there's  a  lot  of  testing  before  serving.  When 


36  STEEL 

it  is  ready,  you  run  to  the  place  where  you  hid  your 
little  flat  manganese  shovel  and  take  it  to  the  gallery 
back  of  the  furnace,  near  the  tap-spout.  There  you 
can  look  down  on  the  pit  strewn  with  those  giant 
bucket-ladles  and  sprinkled  with  the  clean-up  men, 
who  gather  painfully  all  that's  spilled  or  slobbered  of 
hot  metal,  and  save  it  for  a  second  melting.  The 
whole  is  swept  by  the  omnipresent  crane. 

At  a  proper  and  chosen  instant,  the  senior  melter 
shouts,  "Heow!"  and  the  great  furnace  rolls  on  its 
side  on  a  pair  of  mammoth  rockers,  and  points  a  clay 
spout  into  the  ladle  held  for  it  by  the  crane.  Before 
the  hot  soup  comes  rushing,  the  second-helper  has  to 
"ravel  her  out."  That  function  of  his  almost  de- 
stroyed my  ambition  .to  learn  the  steel  business. 
Raveling  is  poking  a  pointed  rod  up  the  tap-spout, 
till  the  stopping  is  prodded  away.  You  never  know 
when  the  desired  but  terrific  result  is  accomplished. 
When  it  is,  he  retires  as  you  would  from  an  explod- 
ing oil-well.  The  brew  is  loose.  It  comes  out,  red  and 
hurling  flame.  Into  the  ladle  it  falls  with  a  hiss  and  a 
terrifying  "splunch."  The  first  and  second  helpers 
immediately  make  matters  worse.  They  stagger  up 
with  bags  (containing  fine  anthracite)  and  drop  them 
into  the  mess.  They  have  a  most  damning  effect. 
The  flames  hit  the  roof  of  the  pit,  and  sway  and  curl 
angrily  along  the  frail  platform  on  which  you  stand. 
Some  occult  reasoning  tells  them  how  many  of  these 
bags  to  drop  in,  whether  to  make  a  conflagration  or 
a  moderate  house-burning. 

The  melter  waits  a  few  minutes  and  then  shouts 


THE  OPEN-HEARTH  37 

your  cue.  You  and  another  helper  run  swiftly  along 
the  gallery  to  the  side  of  the  spout.  At  your  feet  is  a 
pile  of  manganese,  one  of  the  heaviest  substances  in 
the  world,  and  seeming  heavier  than  that.  It's  your 
job  and  your  helper's  to  put  the  pile  into  the  cauldron. 
And  you  do  it  with  all  manner  of  speed.  The  tap 
stream  —  at  steel  heat  —  is  three  feet  from  your  face, 
and  gas  and  sparks  come  up  as  the  stream  hits  the 
ladle.  You're  expected  to  get  it  in  fast.  You  do. 

There  are  almost  always  two  ladles  to  fill,  but  you 
have  a  "spell"  between.  When  she's  tapped,  you 
pick  up  a  piece  of  sheet  iron  and  cover  the  spout  with 
it.  That 's  another  job  to  warm  frost-bitten  fingers. 
Use  gloves  and  wet  burlap  —  it  preserves  the  hands 
for  future  use. 

One  more  step,  and  the  brew  is  an  ingot.  There  are 
several  tracks  entering  the  pit,  and  at  proper  seasons 
a  train  of  cars  swings  in,  bringing  the  upright  ingot 
moulds.  They  stand  about  seven  feet  high  from  their 
flats.  When  the  ladle  is  full  and  slobbering  a  bit,  the 
craneman  swings  her  gingerly  over  the  first  mould. 
Level  with  the  ladle's  base,  and  above  the  train  of 
moulds,  runs  the  pouring  platform,  on  which  the 
ingot-men  stand. 

By  means  of  rods  a  stopper  is  released  from  a  small 
hole  in  the  bottom  of  the  ladle.  In  a  few  seconds  the 
stream  fills  a  mould,  and  the  attendant  shuts  off  the 
steel  like  a  boy  at  a  spigot.  The  ladle  swings  gently 
down  the  line,  and  the  proper  measure  of  metallic 
flame  squirts  into  each  mould.  A  trainload  of  steel 
is  poured  in  a  few  minutes. 


38  STEEL 

But  this  is  when  all  omens  are  propitious.  It 's  when 
the  stopper-man  has  made  no  mistakes.  But  when 
rods  jam  and  the  stopper  won't  stop,  watch  your  step, 
and  cover  your  face.  That  fierce. little  stream  keeps 
coming,  and  nothing  that  the  desperate  men  on  the 
pouring  platform  can  do  seems  likely  to  stem  it.  Soon 
one  mould  is  full.  But  the  ladle  continues  to  pour,  with 
twenty  tons  of  steel  to  go.  It  can't  be  allowed  to  make 
a  steel  floor  for  the  pit.  It  must  get  into  those  moulds. 

So  the  craneman  swings  her  on  to  the  next  mould, 
with  the  stream  aspurt.  It 's  like  taking  water  from 
the  teakettle  to  the  sink  with  a  punctured  dipper: 
half  goes  on  the  kitchen  floor.  But  the  spattering  of 
molten  metal  is  much  more  exciting.  A  few  little  clots 
affect  the  flesh  like  hot  bullets.  So,  when  the  crane- 
man gets  ready  to  swing  the  little  stream  down  the 
line,  the  workers  on  the  platform  behave  like  fright- 
ened fishes  in  a  mill  pond.  Then,  while  the  mould  fills, 
they  come  back,  to  throw  certain  ingredients  into  the 
cooling  metal. 

These  ingots,  when  they  come  from  the  moulds 
virgin  steel,  are  impressive  things  —  especially  on  the 
night  turn.  Then  each  stands  up  against  the  night  air 
like  a  massive  monument  of  hardened  fire.  Pass  near 
them,  and  see  what  colossal  radiators  of  heat  they 
are.  Trainloads  of  them  pass  daily  out  of  the  pit  to 
the  blooming-mill*  to  catch  their  first  transformation. 
But  my  spell  with  them  is  done. 

I  stood  behind  the  furnace  near  the  spout,  which 
still  spread  a  wave  of  heat  about  it,  and  Nick,  the 


THE  OPEN-HEARTH  39 

second-helper,  beside  me  yelling  things  in  Anglo- 
Serbian,  into  my  face.  He  was  a  loose-limbed,  sallow- 
faced  Serbian,  with  black  hair  under  a  green-visored 
cap,  always  on  the  back  of  his  head.  His  shirt  was 
torn  on  both  sleeves  and  open  nearly  to  his  waist, 
and  in  the  uncertain  lights  of  the  mill  his  chest  and  ab- 
domen shone  with  sweat. 

"Goddam  you,  what  you  think.  Get  me"  —  a  long 
blur  of  Serbian,  here  —  "spout,  quick  mak  a"  — 
more  Serbian  with  tremendous  volume  of  voice  — 
"furnace,  see?  You  get  that  goddam  mud!" 

When  a  man  says  that  to  you  with  profound  emo- 
tion, it  seems  insulting,  to  say,  "What"  to  it.  But  that 
was  what  I  did. 

"All  right,  all  right,"  he  said;  "what  the  hell,  me 
get  myself,  all  the  work"  —  blurred  here  —  "son  of 

a  —  third-helper  —  wheelbarrow,  why  don '  you 

quick  now  when  I  say  /" 

"All  right,  all  right,  I'll  do  it,"  I  said,  and  went 
away.  I  was  never  in  my  life  so  much  impressed  with 
the  necessity  of  doing  it.  His  language  and  gesture  had 
been  profoundly  expressive  —  of  what?  I  tried  to  con- 
centrate on  the  phrases  that  seeped  through  emotion 
and  Serbian  into  English.  "Wheelbarrow"  —  hang 
on  to  that;  "mud"  —  that's  easy:  a  wheelbarrow  of 
mud.  Good ! 

I  got  it  at  the  other  end  of  the  mill  —  opposite 
Number  4. 

"Hey!  don't  use  that  shovel  for  mud!"  said  the 
second-helper  on  Number  4. 

So  I  did  n't. 


40  STEEL 

I  wheeled  back  to  the  gallery  behind  Seven,  and 
found  Nick  coming  out  at  me.  When  he  saw  that 
hard-won  mud  of  mine,  I  thought  he  was  going  to 
snap  the  cords  in  his  throat. 

" Goddam  it!  "  he  said,  when  articulation  returned, 
"I  tell  you,  get  wheelbarrow  dolomite,  and  half- 
wheelbarrow  clay,  and  pail  of  water,  and  look  what 
you  bring,  goddam  it!" 

So  that  was  it  —  he  probably  said  pail  of  water 
with  his  feet. 

"Oh,  all  right,"  I  said,  smiling  like  a  skull;  "I 
thought  you  said  mud.  I  '11  get  it,  I  '11  get  it." 

This  is  amusing  enough  on  the  first  day;  you  can  go 
off  and  laugh  in  a  superior  way  to  yourself  about  the 
queer  words  the  foreigners  use.  But  after  seven  days 
of  it,  fourteen  hours  each,  it  gets  under  the  skin,  it 
burns  along  the  nerves,  as  the  furnace  heat  burns 
along  the  arms  when  you  make  back-wall.  It  suddenly 
occurred  to  me  one  day,  after  someone  had  bawled  me 
out  picturesquely  for  not  knowing  where  something 
was  that  I  had  never  heard  of,  that  this  was  what 
every  immigrant  Hunky  endured;  it  was  a  matter  of 
language  largely,  of  understanding,  of  knowing  the 
names  of  things,  the  uses  of  things,  the  language  of 
the  boss.  Here  was  this  Serbian  second-helper  boss- 
ing his  third-helper  largely  in  an  unknown  tongue, 
and  the  latter  getting  the  full  emotional  experience 
of  the  immigrant.  I  thought  of  Bill,  the  pit  boss,  tell- 
ing a  Hunky  to  do  a  clean-up  job  for  him;  and  when 
the  Hunky  said,  "What? "  he  turned  to  me  and  said: 
"Lord!  but  these  Hunkies  are  dumb." 


THE  OPEN-HEARTH  41 

Most  of  the  false  starts,  waste  motion,  misunder- 
standings, fights,  burnings,  accidents,  nerve-wrack, 
and  desperation  of  soul  would  fall  away  if  there  were 
understanding  —  a  common  language,  of  mind  as  well 
as  tongue. 

But  then,  I  thought,  all  this  may  be  because  I'm 
oversensitive.  I  had  this  qualm  till  one  day  I  met 
Jack.  He  was  an  old  regular-army  sergeant,  a  man 
about  thirty.  He  had  come  back  from  fixing  a  bad 
spout.  They  had  sledged  it  out  —  sledged  through 
the  steel  that  had  crept  into  the  dolomite  and  closed 
the  tap-hole. 

"Do  you  ever  feel  low?"  he  said,  sitting  down  on 
the  back  of  a  shovel.  "Every  once'n  while  I  feel  like 
telling  'em  to  take  their  job  and  go  to  hell  with  it; 
you  strain  your  guts  out,  and  then  they  swear  at 
you." 

"I  sometimes  feel  like  a  worm,"  I  said,  "with  no 
right  to  be  living  any  way,  or  so  mad  I  want  to  lick 
the  bosses  and  the  president." 

"If  you  were  first-helper,  it  would  n't  be  so  bad," 
he  mused;  "you  would  n't  have  to  bring  up  that 
damn  manganese  in  a  wheelbarrow  —  and  they 
would  n't  kick  you  round  so  much."  "Will  I  ever  get 
that  job?" 

We  were  washing  up  at  one  end  of  the  mill,  near 
the  Bessemers.  There  was  plenty  of  hot  water,  and 
good  broad  sinks.  I  took  off  my  shirt  and  threw  it  on 
top  of  a  locker;  the  cinder  on  the  front  and  sleeves 
had  become  mud. 


42  STEEL 

Forty  men  stood  up  to  the  sinks,  also  with  their  shirts 
off,  their  arms  and  faces  and  bodies  covered  with  soap, 
and  saying:  "Ah,  ooh,"  and  "ffu,"  with  the  other 
noises  a  man  makes  when  getting  clean.  Every  now 
and  then  somebody  would  look  into  a  three-cornered 
fragment  of  looking-glass  on  one  of  the  lockers,  and 
return  to  apply  soap  and  a  scrubbing-brush  to  the 
bridge  of  his  nose. 

A  group  of  Slovene  boys,  who  worked  on  the  Bes- 
semer, picked  on  one  of  their  number,  and  covered 
him  with  soap  and  American  oaths.  Somebody  told 
an  obscene  story  loudly  in  broken  English. 

The  men  who  had  had  a  long  turn  or  a  hard  one 
washed  up  silently,  except  for  excessive  outbreaks  if 
anybody  took  their  soap.  Some  few  hurried,  and  left 
grease  or  soot  on  their  hands  or  under  their  eyes. 

"I  wash  up  a  little  here,"  said  Fred,  the  American 
first-helper  on  Number  7,  "  and  the  rest  at  home.  Once 
after  a  twenty-four  hour  shift,  I  fell  asleep  in  the  bath- 
tub, and  woke  up  to  find  the  water  cold.  Of  course, 
you  can 't  really  get  this  stuff  off  in  one  or  two  wash- 
ups.  It  gets  under  your  skin.  When  the  furnace  used 
to  get  down  for  repairs,  and  we  were  laid  off,  I  'd  be 
clean  at  the  end  of  a  week."  He  laughed  and  went  off. 

I  had  scraped  most  of  the  soot  from  arms  and  chest, 
and  was  struggling  desperately  with  the  small  of  my 
back.  A  thick-chested  workman  at  the  next  bowl,  with 
fringes  of  gray  hair,  and  a  scar  on  his  cheek,  grabbed 
the  brush  out  of  my  hand. 

"Me  show  you  how  we  do  in  coal-mine,"  he  said; 
and  proceeded  vigorously  to  grind  the  bristles  into 


THE  OPEN-HEARTH  43 

my  back,  and  get  up  a  tremendous  lather,  that  dripped 
down  on  my  trousers  to  the  floor. 

"You  wash  your  buddy's  back,  buddy  wash  yours," 
he  said. 

I  went  out  of  the  open-hearth  shelter  slowly,  and 
watched  the  line  —  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  mile  long  — 
of  swinging  dinner-buckets.  Some  were  large  and 
round,  and  had  a  place  on  top  for  coffee;  some  were 
circular  and  long;  some  were  flat  and  square.  I  looked 
at  the  men.  They  were  the  day-shift  coming  in. 

"I  have  finished,"  I  said  to  myself  automatically. 
"I'm  going  to  eat  and  go  to  bed.  I  don't  have  to 
work  now." 

I  looked  at  the  men  again.  Most  of  them  were 
hurrying;  their  faces  carried  yesterday's  fatigue  and 
last  year's.  Now  and  then  I  saw  a  man  who  looked  as 
if  he  could  work  the  turn  and  then  box  a  little  in  the 
evening  for  exercise.  There  were  a  few  men  like  that. 
The  rest  made  me  think  strongly  of  a  man  holding 
himself  from  falling  over  a  cliff,  with  fingers  that 
paralyzed  slowly. 

I  stepped  on  a  stone  and  felt  the  place  on  my  heel 
where  the  limestone  and  sweat  had  worked  together, 
to  make  a  burn.  I  'd  be  hurrying  in  at  5.00  o'clock  that 
day,  and  they  'd  be  going  home.  It  was  now  7.20. 
That  would  be  nine  and  a  half  hours  hence.  I  had 
to  eat  twice,  and  buy  a  pair  of  gloves,  and  sew  up 
my  shirt,  and  get  sleep  before  then.  I  lived  twenty 
minutes  from  the  mill.  If  I  walk  home,  as  fast  as 
I  can  drive  my  legs  and  bolt  breakfast,  seven  hours  is 


44  STEEL 

all  I  can  work  in  before  3.30.  I  '11  have  to  get  up  then 
to  get  time  for  dinner,  fixing  up  my  shirt,  and  the  walk 
to  the  mill. 

I  wonder  how  long  this  night-shift  of  gray-faced 
men,  with  different-sized  dinner-buckets,  will  be  mov- 
ing out  toward  the  green  gate,  and  the  day-shift  com- 
ing in  at  the  green  gate  —  how  many  years  ? 

The  car  up  from  the  nail  mill  stopped  just  before  it 
dove  under  the  railroad  bridge. 

"I'm  in  luck." 

I  suddenly  had  a  vision  of  how  the  New  York  sub- 
way looked:  its  crush,  its  noise,  its  overdressed  Jews, 
its  speed,  its  subway  smell.  I  looked  around  inside 
the  clattering  trolley-car.  Nobody  was  talking.  The 
car  was  filled  for  the  most  part  with  Slavs,  a  few 
Italians,  and  some  negroes  from  the  nail  mill.  Every- 
one, except  two  old  men  of  unknown  age,  was  under 
thirty-five.  They  held  their  buckets  on  their  laps,  or 
put  them  on  the  floor  between  their  legs.  Six  or  eight 
were  asleep.  The  rest  sat  quiet,  with  legs  and  neck 
loose,  with  their  eyes  open,  steady,  dull,  fixed  upon 
nothing  at  all. 


IV 
EVERYDAY  LIFE 

I  CAME  into  the  mill  five  minutes  late  one  morn- 
ing, and  went  to  the  green  check-house  at  the  gate, 
to  pick  1611,  the  numerical  me,  from  the  hook.  A 
stumpy  man  in  a  chair  looked  up  and  said:  "What 
number?" 

I  gave  it.  "An  easy  way  to  lose  forty-three  cents," 
I  thought,  feeling  a  little  sore  at  the  stumpy  man,  and 
going  out  through  the  door  slowly. 

I  increased  my  step  along  the  road  to  the  open- 
hearth,  and  reached  my  locker  just  as  the  Pole  who 
shared  it  was  leaving. 

"Goddam  gloves! "  he  was  saying.  "Pay  thirty-five 
cents  —  three  days  —  goddam  it  —  all  gone  —  too 
much.  What  you  think?" 

"I  think  the  leather  ones  at  fifty  cents  last  better," 
I  said. 

He  made  a  guttural  noise,  signifying  disgust,  and 
left. 

I  opened  the  locker,  and  disentangled  my  working- 
clothes,  still  damp  from  the  last  shift,  from  the  Pole's. 
I  removed  all  my  "good"  clothes,  and  stood  for  a 
minute  naked  and  comfortable.  The  thermometer 
had  registered  95°  when  I  got  up,  at  4.00. 

For  the  past  few  days  I  had  been  demoted  to  the  pit; 


46  STEEL 

there  had  been  no  jobs  open  on  the  floor.  As  I  took 
up  my  gloves  and  smoked  glasses,  I  wondered  how  I 
could  get  back  to  furnace  work. 

Pete  was  moving  with  his  lurching  short  steps  past 
Six. 

"How  about  helping  to-day  on  the  floor?"  I  said. 

He  snapped  back  quickly  in  his  blurred  voice, 
"You  work  th'  pit,  tell  y'  —  goddam  quick,  want  y' 
on  the  floor." 

I  looked  back  at  him,  swore  to  myself,  and  went 
slowly  down  the  pit  stairs. 

I  could  n't  find  the  gang  at  first,  but  later  found 
half  of  them:  Peter  the  Russian,  the  short  Wop,  the 
Aristocrat,  and  a  couple  more,  all  under  furnace 
Eight,  cleaning  out  cinder.  The  Aristocrat  was  trying 
to  get  the  craneman  to  bring  up  one  of  the  long  boxes 
with  curved  bottoms  for  slag.  The  craneman  was  damn- 
ing him.  There  was  one  too  many  at  the  job,  —  four 
is  enough  to  clean  cinder,  —  so  I  threw  a  bit  of  slag 
at  Peter  (for  old  time's  sake)  and  passed  on. 

I  met  Al,  and  said,  "Where  are  they  working?" 

"Clean  up  the  pipes,"  he  said. 

The  Croat,  Marco,  Joe,  and  Fritz  were  at  Number 
6,  with  forks.  You  see,  the  pipes  run  up  the  ladle's 
side  and  release  a  stopper  for  pouring  the  steel.  They 
are  covered  with  fire  clay,  which  is  destroyed  after 
one  or  two  ladlings  and  has  to  be  knocked  off  and  re- 
placed. We  loosened  the  clay  with  sledges,  and  Marco 
watered  down  the  pipes  with  a  hose,  to  cool  them. 
They  were  moderately  warm  when  Fritz  and  I  started 
piling  them  on  the  truck.  Once  or  twice  the  pipe 


EVERYDAY  LIFE  47 

touched  Fritz's  hand  through  a  hole  in  his  glove,  and 
he  yowled,  and  then  laughed.  Once  or  twice  I  yowled 
and  laughed  also. 

When  we  piled  near  the  top,  we  swung  in  unison, 
and  tossed  the  pipe  into  the  air.  It  was  like  piling 
wood. 

I  caught  a  torn  piece  of  my  pants  on  a  sharp  bit 
of  slag  while  carrying  two  pipes,  and  acquired  a  rip 
halfway  from  pocket  to  knee.  Marco  had  a  safety  pin 
for  me  at  once;  he  kept  emergency  ones  in  his  shirt- 
front. 

We  finished  the  job  in  half  an  hour,  and  pushed  the 
truck  till  it  came  under  jurisdiction  of  a  crane.  Marco 
fixed  the  hooks  rather  officiously,  pushing  Fritz  and 
me  aside.  There  is,  I  suppose,  more  snobbishness  in- 
duced by  the  manner  of  crane-hooking  than  in  any 
other  pit  function.  The  crane  swung  the  pipes  on 
holders  and  dropped  them  in  front  of  the  blacksmith 
shop.  We  carried  them  into  the  shop,  Marco  and  I 
working  together.  Inside  there  were  half  a  dozen 
small  forges,  some  benches,  and  a  drop  hammer.  It 
was  the  place  where  ladles  and  spoons  were  repaired. 
The  blacksmiths  and  helpers  gave  us  friendly,  but 
condescending  glances. 

As  we  walked  back,  we  saw  the  crane  swing  a  ladle 
from  the  moulds  into  which  it  had  been  pouring  to- 
ward the  dumping  pit  in  front  of  Five.  When  the 
giant  bucket  approached,  the  chain  hooked  to  the 
bottom  lifted  slowly,  and  dregs  half-steel,  half-ash, 
rolled  out  into  the  dump.  After  a  little  cooling,  we 
would  clean  up  there.  With  the  chain  released,  the 


48  STEEL 

bucket  righted  itself  with  a  shuddering  clank,  and 
swayed  in  the  air  scattering  bits  of  slag  and  burnt  fire 
clay. 

A  little  later,  we  did  a  three-hour  job  on  those  dregs. 
We  loosened  the  slag  with  picks  first,  and  then  lifted 
forkfuls  and  shovelfuls  into  the  crane-carried  boxes. 
A  good  deal  of  scrap  was  in  the  lot,  probably  the  mak- 
ings of  half  a  ton 'of  steel.  This,  of  course.,  went  into  a 
separate  box.  I  hooked  up  a  couple  of  big  scrap-hunks, 
weighing  perhaps  500  pounds  each,  and  took  some 
sport  out  of  it.  That  is  one  small  matter,  at  least, 
where  a  grain  of  judgment  and  ingenuity  has  place.  A 
badly  hooked  scrap-hunk  may  fall  and  break  a  neck,  or 
simply  tumble  and  waste  everybody's  time.  Loosen- 
ing up  with  the  pick,  too,  demands  a  slight  knack  and 
smacks  faintly  of  the  miner's  skill.  We  had  to  go 
down  into  a  pit,  where  there  was  heated  slag  on  all 
sides,  using  boards  to  save  scorching  our  shoe  leather. 
In  turning  up  fractures  eight  or  ten  inches  thick,  there 
would  be  an  inner  four  inches  still  red-hot. 

At  eleven  o'clock,  I  was  working  at  a  fair  pace, 
flinging  moderately  husky  forkfuls  over  a  ten-foot 
space  into  the  box,  when  Marco  looked  up. 

"Hey,"  he  called. 

I  glanced  at  him  for  a  moment.  He  was  smiling. 
"Rest  yourself,"  he  said;  "we  work  hard  when  de  big 
bosses  come." 

During  the  next  fifty  shovelfuls,  the  remark  went 
the  rounds  of  my  head,  trying  to  get  condemned.  My 
memory  threw  up  articles  in  the  "Quarterly  Journal 
of  Economics,"  with  "inefficiency  and  the  labor- 


EVERYDAY  LIFE  49 

slackers,"  and  "moral  irresponsibility  of  the  worker 
on  the  job,"  and  so  forth,  in  them.  A  couple  of  ser- 
mons and  a  vista  of  editorial  denunciations  of  the 
laboring  man  who  is  no  longer  willing  to  do  "an  hon- 
est day's  work  for  an  honest  day's  pay,"  seemed  to 
bring  additional  pressure  for  righteors  indignation. 
I  asked  the  following  questions  of  myself,  one  for  every 
two  forkfuls :  — 

"Is  n't  it  morally  a  bad  thing  to  soldier,  anyway? 

"Is  Marco  a  moral  enormity? 

"Do  business  men  soldier? 

"Is  n't  'Get  to  hell  out  of  here  if  you  don't  want  to 
work '  the  answer  ?  Or  has  the  twelve-hour  day  some- 
thing to  do  with  it? 

"Can  these  five  or  six  thousand  unskilled  workmen 
take  any  interest  in  their  work,  or  must  they  go  at  it 
with  a  consciousness  similar  to  that  of  the  slaves  who 
put  up  the  Pyramids? " 

I  had  to  use  the  pick  at  this  point,  which  broke  up 
the  inquiry,  and  I  left  the  questions  unanswered. 

I  saw  wheelbarrowing  ahead  for  the  afternoon,  and 
corralled  the  only  one  properly  balanced,  when  I 
started  work  at  1.00  p.  M.,  keeping  it  near  me  during  a 
scrap-picking  hour,  until  the  job  should  break.  At 
2.15,  it  did.  Al  said:  "Get  over  and  clean  out  under 
Seven.  If  we  can  ever  get  this  goddam  stuff  cleaned 
out  -  That  was  an  optimism  of  Al's. 

One  of  the  new  men  and  I  worked  together  all  after- 
noon :  pick  at  the  slag,  shovel,  wheelbarrow,  dump  in 
the  box,  hook  up  to  crane.  Start  over.  There  was  a 


50  STEEL 

lot  of  dolomite  and  old  fine  cinder,  very  dusty,  but  not 
hot.  This  change  in  discomfort  furnished  a  sensation 
almost  pleasurable.  I  found  out  that  everyone  hid 
his  shovel  at  the  end  of  the  shift,  beside  piles  of  brick 
in  the  cellar  of  the  mill,  under  dark  stairways,  and 
so  forth.  I  had  n't  yet  acquired  one,  but  used  most- 
ly a  fork,  which  is  n't  so  personal  an  instrument,  and 
of  which  there  seemed  to  be  a  common  supply.  I  felt 
keen  to  "acquire"  though. 

After  supper,  I  wrote  in  my  diary  and  thought  a 
bit  before  going  to  bed.  There  's  a  genuine  technique 
of  the  shovel,  the  pick,  and  especially  of  the  wheel- 
barrow, I  thought.  That  damn  plank  from  the  ground 
to  the  cinder-box!  It  takes  all  I  can  muster  to  teeter 
the  wheelbarrow  up,  dump  without  losing  the  thing 
quite,  and  bring  it  down  backward  without  barking 
my  shins.  There  's  a  bit  of  technique,  too,  in  pairing 
off  properly  for  a  job,  selecting  your  lick  of  work 
promptly  and  not  getting  left  jobless  to  the  eyes  of 
the  boss,  capturing  your  shovel  and  hiding  it  at  the 
end  of  the  turn,  keeping  the  good  will  of  the  men 
you  're  with  on  team-work,  distinguishing  scrap  from 
cinder  and  putting  them  into  the  proper  boxes,  not 
digging  for  slag  too  deeply  in  the  pit  floor,  and  so 
forth  and  so  on. 

I  wonder  if  I  shall  learn  Serbian,  or  Russian,  or 
Hungarian  ?  There  seems  to  be  a  Slavic  polyglot  that 
any  one  of  a  half-dozen  nationalities  understands. 
That  word,  "Tchekai!  —  Watch  out!"  —  even  the 
Americans  use  it.  It's  a  word  that  is  crying  in  your 


EVERYDAY  LIFE  51 

ears  all  night.  Watch  out  for  the  crane  that  is  taking 
a  ladle  of  hot  metal  over  your  head,  or  a  load  of  scrap, 
or  a  bundle  of  pipes;  watch  out  for  the  hot  cinder 
coming  down  the  hole  from  the  furnace-doors;  watch 
out  for  "me"  while  I  get  this  wheelbarrow  by;  and 
"Heow!  Tchekai!"  for  the  trainload  of  hot  ingots 
that  passes  your  shoulder. 

I  set  my  alarm  for  five  o'clock,  and  got  into  bed 
with  the  good-night  thought  of  "The  devil  with  Pete 
Grayson!  I'll  get  on  that  furnace!" 

Another  day  went  by,  hewing  cinders  in  the  pit.  I 
tried  to  figure  to  myself  persuasive  or  threatening 
things  I  could  say  to  the  melters,  to  let  me  work  on 
the  floor.  A  shrewd-looking  little  man  with  mousta- 
chios  worked  near  me. 

"Did  you  ever  work  on  the  floor? "  I  asked. 

"Oh,  yes,"  he  said:  "too  much  hot;  to  hell  with  the 
money!" 

They  pay  you  two  cents  more  an  hour  on  the  floor. 
At  twenty  minutes  to  five  I  went  upstairs  to  my 
locker.  Dick  Reber,  senior  melter,  stopped  me. 

"Need  a  man  to-night;  want  to  work?"  he  said; 
"always  short,  you  know,  on  this long  turn." 

"Sure,"  I  said. 

That  was  one  way  to  get  promoted,  I  thought,  and 
wondered  how  I  'd  stand  fourteen  more  hours  on  top 
of  the  ten  I  had  had. 

"Beat  it,"  yelled  the  melter. 

Jack  and  I  got  our  flat  manganese  shovels,  and 


52  STEEL 

went  on  the  run  to  the  gallery.  We  were  tapping  at 
last.  This  furnaceful  had  cooked  twenty-two  hours. 
Nick  was  kneeling  on  water-soaked  bagging,  on  the 
edge  of  the  hot  spout.  He  dug  out  the  mud  in  the  tap- 
hole  with  a  pointed  rod  and  sputtered  oaths  at  the 
heat.  Every  few  minutes  the  spout  would  burn 
through  the  bagging  to  his  knees.  He  would  get  up, 
refold  the  bagging,  and  kneel  again  to  the  job. 

Finally  the  metal  gurgled  out,  a  small  stream  the 
size  of  two  fingers.  Nick  dodged  back,  and  it  swelled 
to  a  six-inch  torrent. 

"Heow,  crane!" 

Pete  Grayson  had  come  out,  and  was  bawling  some- 
thing very  urgently  at  the  pit  crane.  The  ladle  swung 
closer;  we  could  feel  the  increased  wave  of  heat. 

He  looked  over  at  us  and  held  up  two  fingers.  That 
meant  both  piles  of  manganese  that  lay  on  the  gallery 
next  the  crane  were  to  be  shoveled  in  —  double  time 
for  us,  in  the  heat. 

"Heow!"  yelled  the  melter. 

Jack  and  I  leaped  forward  to  the  manganese,  and 
our  shovels  scraped  on  the  iron  gallery.  I  saw  Jack 
slapping  his  head  to  put  out  a  little  fire  that  had 
started  on  the  handkerchief  wound  round  his  neck. 
I  slapped  a  few  sparks  that  stung  my  right  leg.  We 
finished  half  the  pile. 

There  was  something  queer  about  this  heat.  The 
soles  of  my  feet  —  why  in  hell  should  the  gallery  burn 
so!  There  was  a  blazing  gas  in  the  air  —  my  nostrils 
seemed  to  flame  as  they  took  it  in.  This  was  different 
from  most  manganese  shoveling.  My  face  glowed  all 


EVERYDAY  LIFE  53 

• 
over  in  single  concentrated  pain.  What  was  it?  I  saw 

Jack  shoveling  wildly  in  the  middle  of  that  second 
pile.  We  finished  it  in  a  panic. 

"What  was  the  matter  with  that  damn  ladle?"  I 
asked  as  we  got  our  breath  in  the  opening  between  the 
furnaces. 

"  Spout  had  a  goddam  hole  in  the  middle,"  he  said; 
"ladle  underneath,  see?'3 

I  did.  The  fire-clay  of  the  spout  had  given  way,  and 
a  hole  forming  in  the  middle  let  the  metal  through. 
That  made  it  necessary,  in  order  to  catch  the  steel,  to 
bring  the  ladle  close,  till  part  of  it  was  under  the  plat- 
form on  which  we  worked.  The  heat  and  gas  from  the 
hot  steel  in  the  ladle  had  been  warming  the  soles  of 
our  feet,  and  rising  into  our  faces. 

"Here's  a  funny  thing,"  I  said,  looking  down.  One 
of  the  sparks  which  had  struck  my  pants  burned 
around,  very  neatly  taking  off  the  cuff  and  an  inch  or 
two  of  the  pant-leg.  The  thing  might  have  been  done 
with  a  pair  of  shears. 

I  came  out  of  the  mill  whistling  and  feeling  pretty 
much  "on  the  crest."  I'd  worked  their  damn  "long 
turn,"  and  stood  it.  It  was  n't  so  bad,  all  except  that 
ladle  that  got  under  the  manganese.  I  ate  a  huge 
breakfast,  with  a  calm  sense  of  virtue  rewarded,  and 
climbed  into  bed  with  a  smile  on  my  lips. 

The  alarm  clock  had  been  ringing  several  minutes 
before  I  realized  what  it  was  up  to.  I  turned  over  to 
shut  it  off,  and  found  needles  running  into  all  the 
muscles  of  my  back.  I  struggled  up  on  an  elbow.  I 
had  a  "hell  of  a  head."  The  alarm  was  still  going. 


54  STEEL 

I  fought  myself  out  of  bed  and  shut  it  off;  stood  up 
and  tried  to  think.  Pretty  soon  a  thought  came  over 
me  like  an  ache :  it  was  "  Fourteen  hours! "  That  was 
beginning  in  fifty-five  minutes  —  fourteen  hours  of 
back-walls,  and  hot  ladles,  and  —  Oh,  hell!  —  I  sat 
down  again  on  the  bed,  and  prepared  to  lift  my  feet 
back  in. 

Then  I  got  up,  and  washed  fiercely,  threw  on  my 
clothes,  and  went  downstairs,  and  out  into  the  after- 
noon sun. 

Down  by  the  restaurant,  I  met  the  third-helper  on 
Eight. 

"Long  turn  would  n't  be  so  bad,  if  there  were  n't 
no  next  day,"  he  said,  with  a  sort  of  smile. 

In  the  mill  was  a  gang  of  malignant  men;  things  all 
went  wrong;  everybody  was  angry  and  tired;  their 
nerves  made  mistakes  for  them. 

"I  only  wish  it  were  next  Sunday!"  I  said  to 
someone. 

"There  are  n't  any  goddam  Sundays  in  this  place," 
he  returned.  "Twenty-four  hours  off  between  two 
working  days  ain't  Sunday." 

I  thought  that  over.  The  company  says  they  give 
you  one  day  off  every  two  weeks.  But  it's  not  like  a 
day  off  anywhere  else.  It's  twenty-four  hours  sand- 
wiched between  two  work-days.  You  finish  your 
night-week  at  7.00  Sunday  morning,  having  just 
done  a  week  of  one  twenty-four  hour  shift,  and  six 
fourteens.  You've  got  all  the  time  from  then  till  the 
next  morning!  Hurrah!  How  will  you  use  it?  If  you 
do  the  normal  thing,  —  eat  breakfast,  and  go  to  bed 


EVERYDAY  LIFE  55 

for  eight  hours,  —  that  brings  you  to  5.00  o'clock. 
Will  you  stay  up  all  night?  you've  had  your  sleep. 
Yes,  but  there's  a  ten-hour  turn  coming  at  7.00. 
You  go  to  bed  at  11.00,  to  sleep  up  for  your  turn. 
There's  an  evening-out  of  it!  Hurrah  again!  But 
who  in  hell  does  the  normal  thing  ?  Either  you  go  on  a 
tear  for  twenty-four  hours,  —  you  only  have  it  twice 
a  month,  —  or  you  sleep  the  twenty-four,  if  the  week 's 
been  a  bad  one.  Or  —  and  this  is  common  in  Bouton 
-  you  get  sore  at  the  system  and  stay  away  a  week  — 
if  you  can  afford  it. 

"Hey,  you,  get  me  a  jigger,  quick.    Ten  thouV 
"All  right,"  I  said,  and  shut  off  my  mind  for  the 
day. 

I  usually  had  bad  words  and  bad  looks  from 
"Shorty."  Jack  calls  him  "that  dirty  Wop."  Late 
one  afternoon  he  produced  a  knife  and  fingered  it 
suggestively  while  he  talked.  So  I  always  watched 
him  with  all  the  eyes  I  had. 

One  day  we  had  shoveled  in  manganese  together 
over  a  hot  ladle,  and  I  noticed  that  he  was  in  a  bad 
mood.  We  finished  and  leaned  against  the  rail. 

"Six  days  more,"  he  said  very  quietly. 

I  looked  up,  surprised  at  his  voice. 

"What  do  you  mean?" 

"Six  days  more,  this  week,  me  quit  this  goddam 
job." 

"What's  the  matter?" 

"Oh,-  -me  lose  thirteen  pound  this  job,  what 
the  hell!" 


56  STEEL 

"What  job  will  you  get  now? " 

"I  don't  know,  I  don't  know;  any  damn  job  better 
than  this,"  he  said  very  bitterly. 

Having  adopted  the  quitting  idea,  these  six  days 
were  too  much  to  endure.  A  little  later,  Jock  was 
ready  to  make  front-wall.  He  saw  Shorty  and  said, 
"Get  me  that  hook  and  spoon." 

Shorty  stood  and  looked  at  Jock,  with  the  utmost 
malignity  in  his  face,  and  said  finally,  "Get  your  god- 
dam hook  and  spoon  yourself." 

Jock  was  greatly  surprised,  and  returned,  "Who  the 
hell  are  you  ? " 

Shorty  snapped  instantly,  "Who  the  hell  are  you  ? " 

And  then  he  was  fired. 

This  is  the  second  "quitting  mad"  I  Ve  seen.  The 
feeling  seems  to  be  something  like  the  irrepressible 
desire  that  gets  piled  up  sometimes  in  the  ranks  of  the 
army  to  "tell  'em  to  go  to  hell"  and  take  the  conse- 
quences. It's  the  result  of  accumulated  poisons  of 
overfatigue,  long  hours,  overwrought  nerves,  "the 
military  discipline  of  the  mills." 

The  practical  advantage  of  being  "given  the  hook" 
is  that  you  can  draw  your  pay  immediately;  whereas, 
if  you  simply  leave,  you  have  to  wait  for  the  end  of  the 
two  weeks'  period. 

I  ate  my  dinner  at  the  Greek's. 

"Make  me  some  tea  that's  hot,  George.  This 
was  n't.  Oh,  and  a  double  bowl  of  shredded;  I  Ve  got 
a  hole  to  fill  up." 

George  kept  the  best  of  the  four  Greek  restaurants. 
It  had  a  certain  variety.  It  splurged  into  potato  salad, 


EVERYDAY  LIFE  57 

and  a  few  other  kinds,  and  went  into  omelets  that 
were  very  acceptable.  The  others  confined  themselves 
to  fried  things,  with  a  few  cereals  and  skimmed  milk. 
I  looked  up  from  my  shredded  wheat.  George  was 
wiping  up  a  rill  of  gravy  and  milk  from  the  porcelain 
table,  and  a  man  was  getting  ready  to  sit  down  op- 
posite. It  was  Herb,  the  pit  craneman. 

"Always  feed  here? "  he  asked. 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "best  place  in  town,  is  n't  it?" 

He  nodded. 

"How  big  is  Bouton?  how  many  people  has  it?"  I 
asked. 

He  grinned  slowly,  and  put  his  elbows  on  the  table. 
He  was  a  Pennsylvania  Dutchman,  with  worry  set- 
tling over  good  nature  in  a  square  face. 
'Twenty  thousand,"  he  said. 

"It  seems  small  for  twenty  thousand,"  I  returned; 
"  like  a  little  village.  There  's  really  only  one  store, 
is  n't  there,  —  the  company  store,  —  where  they  keep 
anything?  Only  one  empty  newspaper,  no  theatre, 
unless  you  count  that  one-story  movie  place,  no 
enterprise  —  " 

"A  one-man  town,"  he  said,  quickly.  "Nearly 
every  house  in  town  is  owned  by  Mr.  Burnham.  Now 
look  here,  suppose  a  man  works  like  hell  to  fix  things 
up,  to  work  around  and  get  a  pretty  damn  good 
garden,  puts  a  lot  of  money  into  making  his  house 
right.  Suppose  he  does,  and  then  gets  into  a  scrap 
with  his  boss.  What  can  he  do?  The  company  owns 
his  house,  the  company  owns  every  other  damn  thing 
in  town.  He  's  got  to  beat  it  — *-  all  his  work  shot 


58  STEEL 

to  hell.  That's  why  nobody  does  anything.  — Hey, 
ham  and  —  Where  you  workin'  now  ?  Ain't  seen  yer 
in  the  pit." 

"I  'm  on  the  floor,  helpin'  on  Number  7." 

"Att-a-boy!" 

At  last,  Saturday  night.  Everyone  felt  Sunday 
coming,  with  twenty-four  hours  of  drunkenness  or 
sleep  alluringly  ahead.  The  other  shift  had  tapped  the 
furnace  at  three  o'clock.  We  might  not  tap  again,  and 
that  was  nice  to  think  about.  A  front-wall  and  a  hot 
back-wall  we  went  through  as  if  it  were  better  fun 
than  billiards. 

"Look  out  for  me,  I've  got  the  de'il  in  me,"  from 
Jock,  Scotch  First  on  Number  8.  I  looked  up,  and  the 
crazy  fool  had  a  spoon  —  they  weigh  over  a  hundred 
—  between  his  legs,  dragging  it  like  a  kid  with  a 
broomstick.  As  it  bounced  on  the  broken  brick  floor, 
he  yelled  like  a  man  after  a  Hun. 

"Who's  the  maun  amang  ye,  can  lick  a  Scotch- 
man?" he  cried,  dropping  the  spoon  to  the  floor. 

"  Is  this  the  best  stuff  you  can  show  on  Number  8  ? " 
said  Fred  slowly.  He  dived  for  Jock's  waist,  and  drew 
it  to  him,  though  the  Scotchman  tried  to  break  his 
grip  with  one  of  his  hands  and  with  the  other  thrust 
off  his  opponent's  face.  When  Fred  had  him  tight,  he 
caught  one  of  Jock's  straying  arms,  bent  it  slowly  be- 
hind his  back,  and  contrived  a  hammerlock. 

;<  You  're  no  gentlemen,"  —  in  pain;  "you  're  inter- 
ruptin'  my  work." 

Fred  relaxed,  and  Jock  jumped  away. 


EVERYDAY  LIFE  59 

"Come  over  to  a  good  furnace,  goddam  it,  and 
fight  it  out! "  he  yelled,  from  a  distance  that  protect- 
ed his  words. 

The  charging-machine,  in  its  perpetual  machine- 
tremolo,  shook  past  and  stopped.  George  slid  down 
from  his  seat,  and  came  over  to  Number  8's  gang. 

"Well,  Fred,  how  in  hell's  the  world  usin'  yer?" 

"Ask  me  that  to-morrow." 

"Well,    guys,    good  night;    I'm    dead  for   forty 


minutes." 


He  picked  up  a  board  some  six  feet  long  and  about 
six  inches  in  width.  He  laid  himself  carefully  on  it, 
and  was  sleeping  inside  of  a  minute. 

I  looked  at  him  enviously  for  a  few  minutes.  Sud- 
denly it  occurred  to  me  that  the  board  lay  over  a  slit 
in  the  floor.  It  was  the  opening  through  which  the 
pipes  that  attach  to  the  gas-valve  rise  and  fall.  When 
gas  is  shifted  from  one  end  of  the  furnace  to  the  other, 
the  pipes  emerge  through  the  slit  to  a  height  several 
feet  from  the  floor.  Finally  Fred  made  the  same  dis- 
covery, and  a  broad  smile  spread  over  his  face.  He 
continued  to  watch  George,  his  grin  deepening.  At 
last  he  turned  to  the  second-helper. 
'Throw  her  over,"  he  said. 

Nick  threw  the  switch.  Slowly  and  easily  the  valve- 
pipes  rose,  lifting  George  and  the  head  of  his  bed  into 
the  air,  perilously.  An  immense  and  ill-controlled 
shout  swelled  up  and  got  ready  to  burst  inside  the 
witnesses.  George  slept  on,  and  the  bed  passed  forty- 
five  degrees.  In  another  second  it  rolled  off  the  side 
of  the  pipes,  and  George,  scared,  half-asleep,  and  much 


60  STEEL 

crumpled,  rolled  over  on  the  furnace  floor.    It  was 
several  seconds  before  he  recovered  profanity. 

The  pure  joy  of  that  event  spread  itself  over  the 
entire  shift. 

When  the  light  from  the  melting  scrap-iron  inside 
the  furnace  shot  back,  it  lit  up  the  hills  and  valleys  in 
Nick's  face.  I  noticed  how  sharp  the  slope  was  from 
his  cheek-bones  to  the  pit  of  his  cheeks,  and  the  round 
holes  in  which  his  eyes  were  a  pool  at  the  bottom. 
His  lips  moved  off  his  white  teeth,  and  twisted  them- 
selves, as  a  man's  do  with  effort.  He  looked  as  if  he 
were  smiling.  I  picked  up  my  shovel,  and  shoved  it 
into  the  dolomite  pile,  with  a  slight  pressure  of  knee 
against  right  forearm  that  eases  your  back.  The  ther- 
mometer in  the  shade  outside  was  95°.  I  wondered 
vaguely  how  much  it  was  where  Nick  stood,  with  the 
doors  open  in  his  face. 

We  walked  back  together  after  the  front-wall  to  the 
trough  of  water. 

"Not  bad  when  you  get  good  furnace,  good  first- 
helper,"  he  said.  "  Fred  good  boy,  but  furnace  no  good. 
A  man  got  to  watch  himself  on  this  job,"  he  went  on 
bitterly;  "he  pull  himself  to  pieces." 

"I  can't  manage  quite  enough  sleep,"  I  said, 
wondering  if  that  was  the  remark  of  a  tenderfoot. 

"  Sometime  —  maybe  one  day  a  month  —  I  feel  all 
right,  good,  no  sleepy,"  he  went  on.  "Daytime  work, 
ten  hour,  all  right,  feel  good;  fourteen  hour  always  too 
much  tired.  Sometime,  goddam,  I  go  home,  I  go  to 
bed,  throw  myself  down  this  way."  He  threw  both 


EVERYDAY  LIFE  61 

arms  backward  and  to  the  side  in  a  gesture  of  desper- 
ate exhaustion,  allowing  his  head  to  fall  back  at  the 
same  time.  "Goddam,  think  I  no  work  no  more.  No 
day  miff  sleep  for  work,"  he  concluded. 

Later  on  in  the  day,  I  saw  Jimmy  let  the  charge-up 
man,  George,  take  the  spoon  and  make  front-wall. 
The  heat  "got  his  goat."  "I  lose  about  ten  or  fifteen 
pounds  every  summer,"  he  said,  "but  I  get  it  back  in 
the  winter.  My  wife  is  after  me  the  whole  time  to 
leave  this  game.  I  tell  her  every  year  I  will.  Better 
quit  this  business,  buddy,  while  you're  young,  before 
you  get  stuck  like  me." 

I  walked  home  with  Stanley,  the  Pole.  He  always 
called  me  Joe,  the  generic  name  for  non-Hunky 
helpers. 

"Say,  Joe,"  he  said,  as  we  came  under  the  railroad 
bridge,  "what's  your  name  right?" 

"Charlie,"  I  answered.  "By  the  way,  where  have 
you  been?" 

"Drunk,  Charlie,"  he  answered,  smiling  cheerfully. 

"Ever  since  I  saw  you  in  the  pit?'3 

'Three  week,"  he  stated,  with  satisfaction;  "beer, 
whiskey,  everyt'ing.  What  the  hell,  work  all  time 
goddam  job,  what  the  hell?" 


WORKING  THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT 

7  A.  M.  Sunday 

I  TRIED  to  get  a  lot  of  sleep  last  night  for  handling 
the  long  turn;  managed  about  nine  hours.  When  I 
came  to  the  locker,  Stanley  w#s  there,  dressed,  clean- 
ing his  smoked  glasses. 

"How  much  sleep  last  night?"  I  asked. 

"Oh,  six,  seven  hour,"  said  Stanley. 

"You  're  a  damned  fool,"  I  said;  "this  is  the  long 


turn." 


"I  know,  I  know,"  he  returned,  "I  have  t'ing  to 
do.  No  have  time  sleep." 

•  I  looked  at  him.  He  had  a  big  frame,  but  his  limbs 
were  hung  on  it,  like  clothes  on  hooks.  His  face  was  a 
gray  pallor,  sharply  caving  in  under  the  cheek-bones. 
His  eyes  were  very  dull,  and  steady.  I  'd  noticed 
those  eyes  of  his  before,  and  never  could  decide 
whether  they  showed  a  kind  of  sullen  defiance,  or  res- 
ignation, or  were  just  extraordinarily  tired. 

"Two  month  more,"  he  said. 

"Two  month  more  what?" 

"Two  month  more  this  work  every  Sunday  —  god- 
dam work  all  day  like  hell,  all  night  like  hell.  Pretty 
soon  go  back  to  good  job." 

I  knew  what  he  meant  now.  He  had  told  me  weeks 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        63 

before,  when  we  had  hewed  cinders  together  in  the  pit, 
how  he  was  a  rougher  in  a  Pittsburgh  mill.  Worked 
onlv  twelve  hours  a  day  and  no  Sundays. 

"No  more  goddam  long  turn,"  he  concluded; 
"work  of  rougher  slack  now,  all  right  October." 

He  moved  off  slowly,  with  no  spring  in  his  step, 
and  no  energy  expended  beyond  what  was  absolutely 
necessary  to  move  him. 

I  walked  out  on  the  floor  to  look  at  the  clock.  The 
night  gang  on  every  furnace  was  washing  up,  very 
cheerfully  and  with  an  extraordinary  thoroughness. 
They  were  slicking  up  for  the  once  a  fortnight  twenty- 
four-hour  party.  Nearly  everyone  drank  through  his 
day  off,  or  raised  hell  in  some  extraordinary  manner. 
It  was  too  precious  and  rare  to  spend  in  less  violent 
reaction  to  the  two  weeks'  fatigue.  I  looked  at  them 
and  tried  not  to  be  envious.  The  first-helper  on  Seven 
was  taking  a  last  look  through  the  peepholes  as  he  put 
on  his  collar.  A  great  Slavic  hulk  on  Number  5  was 
brushing  his  clothes  with  unheard  of  violence. 

Dick  Reber  passed  by.  He  saw  me  leaning  against 
a  girder  buttoning  my  shirt. 

"Front-wall,  Number  5,  you!"  he  bawled. 

I  was  sore  at  myself  for  having  been  seen  standing 
about  doing  nothing.  But  I  was  sore  at  Dick  also,  un- 
reasonably. I  went  back  to  my  locker,  got  my  gloves, 
and  went  to  Number  5.  I  began  filling  the  spoon, 
with  the  help  of  "Marty,"  the  Wop.  He  glared  at  me, 
and  interfered  with  my  shovel  twice  when  we  went 
together  to  the  dolomite  pile.  Marty  had  made  ene- 
mies widely  on  the  furnaces  because  of  a  loud  mouth, 


64  STEEL 

and  an  officiousness  that  sat  ridiculously  on  his  stature 
and  his  ignorance  of  steel-making. 

I  was  glad  when  the  front-wall  was  done.  I  took  the 
hook  down,  and  went  over  to  the  fountain  in  back  of 
Five,  cooled  my  head,  neck,  and  arms,  and  went  over 
to  Seven,  without  taking  a  swallow.  I  had  decided  to 
have  only  two  drinks  of  water  in  the  half-day. 

Dick  Reber  saw  me  coming  up  and,  I  think  in 
punishment  for  loafing,  said:  "Clean  up  under  there. 
I  want  you  to  clean  all  that  filth  out,  all  of  it,  from 
behind  that  girder." 

It  was  near  the  locker  and  under  the  flooring,  in  a 
sort  of  shelf,  where  lime,  dolomite,  dirt,  old  gloves, 
shoes,  filth  of  all  sorts  had  accumulated.  I  cleaned  it 
out  with  a  broom  and  a  stick.  It  took  me  half  an 
hour. 

"All  right,"  said  the  first-helper;  "now  get  me  ten 
thousand." 

So  I  went  off  to  the  Bessemer,  rather  glad  of  the 
walk.  I  climbed  the  stairs  to  the  pouring  platform, 
and  watched  the  recorder,  who  had  left  his  book, 
operate  the  levers.  The  shifting  engine  backed  a 
ladle  under,  and  slowly  the  huge  pig-iron  mixer, 
bubbling  and  shooting  out  a  tide  of  sparks,  dipped  and 
allowed  about  20,000  pounds  to  drop  into  the  ladle. 

"Ten  thou'  for  Seven,"  I  said. 

In  another  five  minutes,  the  engine  brought  up  a 
ladle  for  my  ten  thousand,  and  the  boy  dipped  it  out 
for  me  with  the  miraculous  levers. 

"All  right,"  I  said;  and  ran  down  the  stairs  fast 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        65 

enough  to  catch  a  ride  back  past  the  furnaces,  on  the 
step  of  the  locomotive. 

The  second-helper  grabbed  the  big  hook  which 
came  down  slowly  on  a  chain  from  the  crane,  and 
stuck  it  into  the  bottom  of  the  ladle.  As  the  chain 
lifted,  the  ladle  tipped,  and  poured  the  ten  thousand 
pounds  with  a  hiss.  But  the  craneman  was  careless, 
which  is  n't  usual.  Fred  kept  saying,  "Whoop, 
whoop!"  but  he  went  right  on  spilling  for  quite  a 
spell  before  he  recovered  control. 

"Dolomite,"  said  the  first-helper  to  me,  after  the 
"jigger"  was  poured. 

I  went  to  a  box  full  of  the  white  gravel,  at  the  end 
of  the  mill,  and  yelled  at  Herb,  the  craneman.  A  box 
of  dolomite  is  about  eight  feet  square  and  three  high. 
This  one  was  perched  on  top  of  a  dolomite  pile,  ten 
feet  off  the  ground.  I  struggled  up  on  top,  and  took 
the  hooks  Herb  gave  me  from  the  crane,  —  eight-inch 
hooks,  —  and  put  them  into  the  corners  of  the  box, 
using  both  hands.  Then  I  slid  down,  and  the  box  rose 
and  swung  over  my  head. 

Herb  settled  it  neatly  on  our  own  little  dolomite 
pile  in  front  of  Seven.  I  slipped  out  the  front  hooks, 
and  the  back  ones  lifted  and  dumped  the  load,  with 
a  soft  swish,  nearly  on  the  low  part  of  the  old  pile. 

There  was  a  little  time  to  sit  down  after  this  —  per- 
haps ten  minutes.  I  smoked  a  Camel,  which  had 
spent  the  last  shift  in  my  shirt  pocket.  It  was  a  mel- 
ancholy Camel,  and  tended  to  twist  up  in  my  nose, 
but  it  tasted  sweet.  I  sat  on  Seven's  bench,  and 


66  STEEL 

watched  Fred  take  his  rod  and  move  aside  the  shut- 
ters of  the  peepholes,  to  give  final  looks  at  the  furnace. 
She  must  be  nearly  ready.  He  looked  back  at  me,  and 
I  knew  that  meant  "test." 

I  grabbed  tongs,  lying  spread  out  by  the  anvil, 
clamped  hold  of  the  mould,  and  ran  with  them  to 
about  ten  feet  from  number  two  door  of  the  furnace. 
Fred  had  the  test-spoon  lifted  and  shoved  into  the 
door;  he  moved  it  around  in  the  molten  steel,  and 
brought  it  out  full,  straining  his  body  tense  to  hold  it 
level  and  not  lose  the  test.  I  shifted  the  mould  a  little 
on  the  ground,  and  closed  my  hands  as  tight  as  I  could 
on  the  tongs,  so  the  mould  would  n't  slip  and  turn.  He 
poured  easily  and  neatly,  just  filling  the  mould,  and 
flung  the  spoon  violently  on  the  floor,  to  shake  off  the 
crusting  steel  on  the  handle. 

I  ran  with  mould  and  tongs  to  the  water-trough  in 
front  of  Eight,  and  plunged  it  in,  the  steam  coming 
up  in  a  small  cloud.  I  brought  it  out  and  held  it  on  the 
anvil,  end-wise,  with  the  tongs,  while  Nick  flattened 
in  the  top  slightly  on  both  edges,  to  make  it  break 
easily.  Nick  broke  the  ingot  in  two  blows,  and  Fred 
and  the  melter  consulted  over  the  fragments. 

"All  right,"  said  Dick. 

We  were  about  to  tap.  I  went  after  my  flat  man- 
ganese shovel,  but  it  was  gone  from  the  locker.  Some 
dog-gone  helper  has  nailed  it.  I  took  out  an  ordinary 
flat  shovel. 

In  back  of  the  furnace  Nick  was  already  busy  with 
a  "picker,"  prodding  away  the  stopping  from  the  tap. 
He  burned  his  hands  once,  swore,  gave  it  up,  went 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        67 

halfway  along  the  platform  away  from  the  tap,  re- 
turned, and  went  at  it  again.  Finally,  the  steel  es- 
caped, with  its  usual  roar  of  flame  and  its  usual 
splunch  as  it  fell  into  the  ladle. 

I  stepped  back,  and  nearly  into  "  Shorty,"  who  had 
come  to  help  shovel  manganese.  "Where  you  get 
shovel?"  he  said,  with  his  eyes  blazing,  pointing  to 
mine. 

"Out  of  my  locker,"  I  said. 

He  started  toward  it,  and  I  held  it  away  from  him. 

"I  tell  you  that  goddam  shovel  mine  — "  he  began; 
but  Dick,  from  the  other  side  of  the  spout,  shouted  at 
us  how  many  piles  to  shovel,  and  Shorty  shut  up.  We 
were  to  get  in  the  first  big  pile  and  the  next  little  one. 

The  ladle  was  beginning  to  fill.  "Heow!"  yelled 
Dick. 

Shorty  and  I  went  forward  and  put  in  the  manga- 
nese. It  was  hot,  but  I  took  too  much  interest  in 
shoveling  faster  than  Shorty,  to  care.  Then  came  the 
second  ladle,  during  which  Shorty's  handkerchief 
caught  on  fire,  and  made  him  sputter  a  lot,  and  rid 
himself  of  some  profanity  in  Anglo-Italian. 

I  went  to  that  trough  by  Eight  afterward,  to  wash 
off  the  soot  and  cinder,  and  put  my  head  under  water, 
straight  down.  I  knew  back-wall  was  coming,  and  sat 
down  a  minute,  wondering,  rather  vaguely,  how  I  was 
going  to  feel  at  six  or  seven  the  next  morning. 

Back-wall  came.  I  had  bad  luck  with  it,  trying  too 
hard.  It  was  too  hot  for  one  thing.  There  are  times 
when  a  back-wall  will  be  so  cool  you  can  hesitate  a 
long  second,  as  you  fling  your  shovelful,  and  make 


68  STEEL 

sure  of  your  aim;  at  others,  your  face  scorches  when 
you  first  swing  back,  and  you  let  the  stuff  off  any 
fashion,  to  get  out  of  the  heat.  There's  a  third-helper 
on  Five,  I'm  glad  to  say,  who  is  worse  than  I.  They 
put  him  out  of  the  line  this  time;  he  was  just  throw- 
ing into  the  bottom  of  the  furnace. 

Everyone  develops  an  individual  technique.  Jim- 
my's is  bending  his  knees,  and  getting  his  shovel  so 
low  that  it  looks  like  scooping  off  the  floor.  Fred's  is 
graceful,  with  a  smart  snap  at  the  end. 

Then  front-wall.  I  start  in  search  of  a  spoon  and  a 
hook.  It's  not  easy  to  get  one  to  suit  the  taste  of  my 
first-helper.  There's  one  that  looks  twenty  feet,  —  I 
haven't  any  technical  figures  on  spoons, --but  it's 
too  long,  I  know,  for  Fred.  There  's  a  spoon  three  feet 
shorter,  just  right.  Hell  —  with  two  inches  melted  off 
the  end!  I  pick  a  short  one  in  good  repair,  —  he  can 
use  the  thing  or  get  his  own,  —  and  drag  it  to  Seven, 
giving  the  scoop  a  ride  on  the  railroad  track,  to  ease 
the  weight.  Fred  has  put  a  hook  over  number  one  door ; 
so  I  hurry,  and  lift  the  spoon  handle  with  gloved  hands 
to  slip  it  on  the  hook.  If  it 's  not  done  quickly,  you  '11 
get  a  burn;  you  're  an  arm's  length  from  molten  steel, 
and  no  door  between.  I  get  it  on,  and  pick  up  a  shovel. 

Front-wall  can  be  very  easy,  —  you  can  nearly  en- 
joy it,  like  any  of  the  jobs,  —  if  the  furnace  is  cool,  and 
there's  a  breeze  blowing  down  the  open  spaces  of  the 
mill.  And,  too,  if  the  spoon  hangs  right  in  the  hook, 
and  the  first-helper  turns  it  a  little  for  you,  then  you 
can  stand  off,  six  feet  from  the  flame,  and  toss  your 
gravel  straight  into  the  spoon's  scoop.  You  hardly  go 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        69 

to  the  water  fountain  to  cool  your  head  when  the 
stunt 's  over.  On  number  one  the  hook  hung  wrong,  the 
spoon  would  n't  turn  in  it,  and  you  had  to  hug  close, 
and  pour,  not  toss.  I  tried  a  toss  on  my  second  shovel, 
and  half  of  it  skated  on  the  floor. 

"Get  it  on  the  spoon,  goddam  you!"  from  Nick. 

So  I  did. 

After  that,  we  sat  around  for  twenty  minutes.  Fred 
looked  at  the  furnace  once  or  twice,  and  changed  the 
gas.  Several  gathered  in  front  of  Seven  —  Jock,  Dick, 
the  melter,  Fred,  and  Nick. 

"Do  you  know  what  my  next  job  's  going  to  be? " 
said  Fred. 

The  others  looked  up. 

"In  a  bank." 

"Nine  to  five,"  said  Dick.  "Huh!  gentlemen's 
hours." 

"Saturday  afternoons,  and  Sundays,"  said  Fred. 

The  other  faces  glowed  and  said  nothing. 

"This  would  n't  be  so  bad  if  there  were  Sundays," 
said  Fred. 

"I  '11  tell  you,  there'll  come  a  time,"  broke  in  the 
melter,  "when  Gary  and  all  the  other  big  fellers  will 
have  to  work  it  themselves  —  no  one  else  will." 

"Now  in  the  old  country,  a  man  can  have  a  bit  of 
fun,"  said  the  Scotchman.  "Picnics,  a  little  singin' 
and  drinkin',  —  and  the  like.  What  can  a  man  do 
here?  We  work  eight  hours  in  Scotland.  They  work 
eight  hours  in  France,  in  Italy,  in  Germany  —  all  the 
steel  mills  work  eight  hours,  except  in  this  bloody  free 
country." 


70  STEEL 

The  melter  broke  in  again.  " It's  the  dollar  they  're 
after  —  the  sucking  dollar.  They  say  they  're  going  to 
cut  out  the  long  turn.  I  heard  they  were  going  to  cut 
out  the  long  turn  when  I  went  to  work  in  the  mill,  as  a 
kid.  I'm  workin'  it,  ain't  I?  Christ!" 

I  left,  to  shovel  in  fluor  spar  with  Fred. 

When  we  finished,  Fred  said:  "You  better  get  your 
lunch  now,  if  you  want  it.  Then  help  Nick  on  the 
spout." 

I  ate  in  the  mill  restaurant.  My  order  was  roast 
beef,  which  included  mashed  potato,  peas,  and  a  cup 
of  coffee  —  for  thirty-five  cents.  Then  I  had  apple 
pie  and  a  glass  of  milk.  The  waiters  are  a  fresh  Jew, 
named  Beck,  and  a  short,  fat  Irish  boy,  called  Pop. 
There  is  a  counter,  no  tables;  the  food  is  clean. 

I  went  back  to  help  Nick  on  the  spout,  and  found 
him  already  back  on  the  gallery  with  a  wheelbarrow 
of  mud.  He  looked  up  gloomily  and  said:  "One 


more." 


I  dumped  the  wheelbarrow,  and  went  after  more, 
bounced  it  over  tracks  and  a  hose,  and  up  and  down 
a  little  board  runway  to  where  the  mud-box  stands. 
After  filling  up,  I  went  back  slowly,  dangerously, 
swayingly,  over  bits  of  dolomite  and  coal,  navigated 
the  corner  of  the  gallery  by  a  hair's  tolerance,  and 
dropped  the  handles  of  the  wheelbarrow  by  Nick  with 
relief.  It's  bad  on  my  back,  that 's  it.  I'd  rather  do 
two  back-walls,  and  tap  three  times  in  high  heat,  than 
wheel  these  exacting  loads  of  mud. 

Nick  knelt  on  the  other  side  of  the  spout,  and  I  gave 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        71 

him  the  mud  with  my  shovel,  to  repair  the  holes  and 
broken  places  of  the  spout,  which  the  last  flow  of 
molten  steel  had  carried  away.  When  he  finished  the 
big  holes,  I  gave  him  small  gobs  of  mud,  dipping  my 
hands  in  a  bucket  of  water  between  each  two,  to  keep 
the  stuff  from  sticking.  A  wave  of  weakening  heat 
rose  constantly  from  the  spout  still  hot  from  the  last 
flow.  I  prayed  God  Nick  would  hurry.  He  made  a 
smooth  neat  surface  on  the  whole  seven-feet  of  spout, 
rounding  the  edges  with  his  hands. 

When  I  came  back  from  the  spout,  Fred  was  in 
front  of  the  furnace,  blue  glasses  on  his  nose,  inspect- 
ing the  brew.  He  put  his  glasses  back  on  his  cap, 
glanced  at  me,  and  pointed  to  a  pile  of  dolomite  and 
slag  which  had  been  growing  in  front  of  Number  3 
door. 

"  All  right,"  I  said,  and  picked  up  a  shovel  from  the 
dolomite  pile.  For  a  couple  of  minutes,  I  shoveled  the 
stuff  down  the  slag  hole,  and  remembered  vividly  the 
bygone  pit-days.  Then  I  would  have  been  cleaning  up 
around  the  buggy.  For  a  minute  I  felt  vastly  superior 
to  pit  people.  I  earned  two  cents  more  an  hour,  and 
threw  down  a  hole  the  dolomite  and  dirt  they  cleared 
away. 

I  began  to  feel  a  little  tired  in  back  and  legs,  and 
repeated  Fred's  formula  on  how  to  get  away  with  a 
long  turn:  "Take  it  like  any  other  day  to  five  o'clock. 
Then  work  for  midnight.  Anyone  can  stand  it  from 
midnight  to  morning."  I  did  a  front-wall  on  that  basis. 

"Watch  those  buggies!" 

I  ran  over  to  the  furnace  and  glanced  down  the  slag 


72  STEEL 

hole,  yelling  back,  "Half  full."  Then  Fred  went  to  an 
electric  switch,  and  the  whole  furnace  tilted  till  the 
hot  running  slag  flowed  over  at  the  doors,  and  dripped 
into  the  buggy-car  beneath,  in  the  pit.  I  held  my 
hand  up  as  one  of  them  filled,  and  Fred  caught  the 
pitching  furnace  with  the  switch,  and  stopped  the 
flow  of  slag. 

4  P.  M.  Sunday 

Number  8  furnace  tapped,  and  I  shoveled  manga- 
nese into  the  ladle  with  that  man  from  Akron,  who  is 
new,  and  who,  I  noticed,  burned  his  fingers  in  the  same 
way  I  did  on  my  first  day.  Then  back-wall  and  front- 
wall,  and  Jock  saying  all  the  while,  "It 's  a  third  gone, 
lads." 

5  P.  M.  Sunday 
I  felt  much  more  tired  after  this  first  ten  hours  than 

later;  it  was  the  limp  fatigue  that  comes  from  too 
much  heat.  I  ate  fried  eggs  and  a  glass  of  milk,  and 
then  my  appetite  took  a  start  and  I  ordered  cold 
lamb  and  vegetables.  When  I  finished,  I  went  back 
into  the  mill  to  my  locker,  and  took  out  a  cigarette. 
I  sat  on  a  pile  of  pipes  against  a  main  girder,  intend- 
ing to  smoke;  the  cigarette  went  out,  and  I  slept  a 
half  hour. 

Things  were  going  first-rate  from  six  to  nine.  Jig- 
ger, clean  up  scrap,  front-wall  Number  6,  front-wall 
Number  8.  I  could  n't  distinguish  between  this  and 
any  other  night  shift;  the  food  must  have  acted  for 
sleep.  But  after  nine  the  hours  dragged.  From  9.20  to 
10.00  was  a  couple  of  hours. 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        73 

In  the  middle  of  a  front-wall,  I  saw  the  efficien- 
cy man,  Mr.  Lever,  come  through  and  stare  at  the 
furnace,  walk  around  a  little,  and  stare  profound- 
ly at  the  furnace.  Mr.  Lever  was  pointed  in  two 
places,  I  noticed  for  the  first  time.  He  had  a  pointed 
stomach,  and  his  face  worked  into  a  point  at  his  nose. 
I  noticed  carefully  that  he  had  a  receding  chin  and  a 
receding  forehead.  As  he  watched  us  scoop  the  dolo- 
mite, drag  up  to  the  spoon,  dump,  scoop  up  the  dolo- 
mite, and  do  it  over,  for  three  quarters  of  an  hour,  I 
thought  about  him.  I  wanted  to  go  up  to  him,  and 
give  him  my  shovel.  I  had  to  struggle  against  that 
impulse  —  to  go  up  to  him  and  give  him  my  shovel. 

The  evening  dragged.  I  fought  myself,  to  keep  from 
looking  at  the  clock.  I  fought  for  several  hours  after 
ten  o'clock,  and  then,  when  I  thought  dawn  must  be 
breaking,  went  up  and  found  it  ten  minutes  of  eleven. 

I  did  feel  relieved  at  twelve,  and  went  out  to  the 
restaurant,  saying:  "Hell,  anyone  can  wait  till  morn- 
ing." 

Sometimes,  when  things  are  hurried,  when  tapping 
is  near  or  a  spout  is  to  be  fixed,  you  have  to  eat  still 
drenched  in  sweat.  But  to-night  I  had  time,  and  at 
quarter  of  twelve  hung  my  shirt  on  the  hot  bricks  at 
the  side  of  the  furnace,  and  stood  near  the  doors  in  the 
heat,  to  dry  my  back  and  legs.  I  then  washed  soot 
and  dolomite  dust  from  ears  and  neck,  and  dipped  my 
left  arm,  which  was  burned,  in  cold  water.  At  twelve 
I  put  on  the  dried  shirt,  and  went  to  eat. 

Half  the  men  wash,  half  don't.  There  were  a 
number  of  open-hearth  helpers  in  the  restaurant, 


74  STEEL 

with  black  hands  and  faces,  two  eating  soup,  two  with 
their  arms  on  the  counter.  Their  faces  lacked  any  ex- 
pression beyond  a  sullen  fatigue;  but  their  eyes  roved, 
following  Beck  about.  Lefflin  had  his  arms  on  the 
counter  and  his  face  on  them. 

I  ate  ham  and  eggs,  which  included  coffee,  fried 
potatoes,  two  slices  of  bread,  and  a  glass  of  milk. 

Walking  back  to  the  furnaces  was  an  effort  of  will. 
I  climbed  the  embankment  to  the  tracks  very  slowly, 
the  stones  and  gravel  loosening  and  tumbling  down- 
hill at  each  step.  I  tried  hard  to  concentrate  on  a 
calculation  of  the  probable  number  of  front-walls  to 
come.  Then  I  wondered  if  it  would  n't  pay  to  cut  out 
breakfast  in  the  morning,  and  get  nine  hours  of  sleep 
instead  of  eight  and  a  quarter.  Friselli  came  up  the 
bank  behind  me.  He  is  third  on  Number  6. 

"Well,"  I  said,  "make  lots  of  money  to-night." 

"What's  the  good  money,  kill  yourself?"  he  said, 
and  went  past  me  along  the  tracks. 

Number  8  was  preparing  to  make  front-wall.  I  felt 
weary,  and  full  of  ham  and  eggs,  and  very  desirous  of 
sitting  down  right  there  on  the  floor.  But  Jock,  the 
first-helper  on  Eight,  said,  "Oh,  Walker!"  when  he 
saw  me,  and  we  began. 

Through  that  front-wall  Jock  was  tiring.  He  worked 
in  little  spurts.  For  "half  a  door"  he  would  sing,  and 
goad  us  on  in  half-Scotch,  and  for  the  next  half  he 
would  be  silent,  and  wipe  his  face  with  his  sleeve. 
After  that  door,  he  came  up  to  us  and  said  with  pro- 
found conviction,  "It 's  a  lang  turn,  it 's  a  lang  turn." 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        75 

When  we  finished,  Jock  lay  down  on  a  bench. 

It 's  a  part  of  a  third-helper's  duties  to  keep  five  or 
six  bags  of  fine  anthracite  coal  on  the  little  gallery 
back  of  the  furnace,  near  the 'spout.  I  went  after  that 
little  job  now.  Fifty  pounds  of  coal  in  a  thick  paper 
bag  is  n't  much  to  carry,  till  you  get  doing  it  a  couple 
of  days  running. 

I  sat  on  the  seat  where  the  Wop  stays  who  works 
the  furnace-doors;  they  call  him  the  "pull  up."  That 
had  some  sacks  and  a  cushion,  and  was  broad,  with 
a  girder  for  back.  I  fell  asleep. 

Something  twisting  and  pinching  my  foot  woke 
me  up.  It  was  the  first-helper.  "Fifteen  thousand, 
quick!"  he  said.  I  got  up  with  a  jerk,  feeling  not 
so  sleepy  as  I  expected,  but  immeasurably  stiff.  I 
moved  in  a  wobbly  fashion  down  toward  the  Besse- 
mer. I  felt  as  if  I  were  limping  in  four  or  five  direc- 
tions. Very  vigorously  and  insistently  I  thought  of  one 
thing.  I  would  look  at  the  clock  opposite  Number  6 
when  I  went  by,  and  possibly,  very  probably,  a  whole 
pile  of  hours  had  been  knocked  off.  Then  I  thought 
with  a  sting  that  we  had  not  tapped,  and  it  could  n't 
be  more  than  three  o'clock.  It  was  two! 

"Fifteen  thousand,"  I  said  to  myself,  "quick"; 
and  climbed  the  iron  stairs  to  the  Bessemer  platform. 

When  I  came  back,  I  walked  beside  the  locomotive 
as  it  dragged  the  ladle  and  the  fifteen  thousand 
pounds  of  molten  pig  iron.  Through  closing  eyes 
I  watched  the  charging-machine  thrust  in  the 
spout.  That  long  finger  lifted  the  clay  thing  from  its 


76  STEEL 

resting-place  on  the  big  saw-horses  between  furnaces. 
Then,  moving  on  the  rails,  the  machine  adjusted  it- 
self in  front  of  number  two  door,  and  shoved  the  spout 
in  with  a  jar. 

I  stood  lazily  watching  the  pouring  of  the  molten 
steel.  Fred  motioned  slowly  with  his  hands,  with 
"Up  a  little,  whoop!"  as  the  stream  flowed  very 
cleanly  into  the  spout  and  furnace.  Then  came  the 
noise  of  lifting,  that  characteristic  crane  grind,  with  a 
rising  inflection  as  it  gained  speed  and  moved  off. 
"Pretty  soon  tapping,  after  tapping  back-wall,  front- 
wall,  the  spout,  morning,"  I  meditated. 

"Well,  how  in  hell  are  you  ? "  It  was  Al,  the  pit  boss. 

"Fine!  "  I  said  as  loudly  as  I  could;  and  went  and 
sat  down  at  once.  My  chin  hit  my  chest.  I  stopped 
thinking,  but  did  n't  go  to  sleep. 

"Test!"  yelled  Fred. 

We  tested  three  times,  and  then  tapped.  There  were 
two  ladles,  with  four  piles  of  manganese,  to  shovel 
in.  A  third-helper  from  Number  4,  a  short  stocky 
Italian,  shoveled  with  me.  The  ladle  swung  slightly 
closer  to  the  gallery  than  usual,  and  sent  up  a  bit 
more  gas  and  sparks.  We  put  out  little  fires  on  our 
clothes  six  or  seven  times.  After  the  first  ladle,  the 
Italian  put  back  the  sheet  iron  over  the  red-hot  spout, 
and  after  the  second  ladle,  I  put  it  on.  We  rested  be- 
tween ladles,  in  a  little  breeze  that  came  through  be- 
tween furnaces. 

"What  you  think  of  this  job? "  he  asked. 

"Pretty  bad,"  I  said,  "but  pretty  good  money." 

He  looked  up,  and  the  veins  swelled  on  his  forehead. 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        77 

His  cheeks  were  inflamed,  and  his  eyes  showed  the 
effects  of  the  twenty  hours  of  continuous  labor. 

"To  hell  with  the  money!  "  he  said,  with  quiet  pas- 
sion; "no  can  live." 

The  words  sank  into  my  memory  for  all  time. 

The  back-wall  was,  I  think,  no  hotter  than  usual, 
but  men's  nerves  made  them  mind  things  they  would 
have  smirked  at  the  previous  morning.  The  third- 
helper  on  Eight  and  Nick  quarreled  over  a  shovel,  and 
Nick  sulked  till  Fred  went  over  and  spoke  to  him. 
Once  the  third-helper  got  in  Nick's  way.  "Get  out,  or 
I'll  break  your  goddam  neck!  "  And  so  on  — 

I  felt  outrageously  sore  at  everyone  present  —  not 
least,  myself.  After  that  back-wall  all  except  Fred 
threw  their  shovels  with  violence  on  the  floor,  and 
went  to  the  edge  of  the  mill.  They  stood  about 
in  the  little  breeze  that  had  come  up  there,  in  a  state 
of  fatigue  and  jangled  nerves,  looking  out  on  a  pale 
streak  of  morning  just  visible  over  freight  cars  and 
piles  of  scrap. 

We  made  front-wall,  and  when  it  was  over,  I  went 
to  the  bench  by  the  locker  and  sat  down,  to  try  to  for- 
get about  the  spout.  I  had  been  forgetting  about  it 
for  twenty  minutes  when  Nick  came  up,  and  shook 
me,  thinking  I  had  fallen  asleep. 

"Mud,"  he  said. 

I  got  him  mud. 

Nick  fixed  up  the  spout  amid  an  inclination  to 
cursing  in  Serbian,  and  gave  me  commands  in  loud 
tones  in  the  same  language.  I  felt  exceedingly  in- 
different to  Nick  and  to  the  spout,  and  finished  up  in 


78  STEEL 

a  state  of  enormous  indifference  to  all  things  save  the 
chance  of  sleep.  Jack,  the  second-helper  of  Eight,  was 
making  tea,  having  dipped  out  some  hot  steel  with  a 
test-spoon,  and  set  a  tea-pot  on  it. 

"Want  some?"  he  said. 

I  nodded. 

Watching  him  make  it,  and  drinking  the  tea  woke 
me  up. 

"What  time  is  it?"   I  asked. 

"Four-thirty,"  said  he. 

"Thanks  for  the  tea." 

Then  the  summoning  signal  for  a  third-helper  rang 
out —  a  sledge-hammer  pounding  on  sheet  iron.  They 
were  "spooning  up,"  that  is,  making' front-wall,  on 
Number  6.  All  through  that  stunt  I  was  wide  awake, 
quite  refreshed,  though  with  the  sense,  the  conviction, 
that  I  had  been  in  the  mill,  doing  this  sort  of  thing, 
for  a  week  at  the  inside. 

Coming  back  to  Seven  from  that,  I  found  Fred  flat 
on  his  back,  looking  "all  in."  Jock  came  up  for  a 
drink  of  water,  and  looked  over  at  me. 

"You  look  to  me,"  he  remarked,  "like  the  breaking 
up  of  a  bad  winter."  He  laughed. 

5  A.  M.  Monday 

The  sun  came  into  the  mill,  looking  very  pallid  and 
sick  beside  the  bright  light  from  the  metal.  I  watched 
the  men  on  Eight  make  back-wall,  and  heard  the 
sounds;  I  sat  on  the  bench,  my  legs  as  loose  as  I 
could  make  them,  my  head  forward,  eyes  just  raised. 
"Lower,  lower,  goddam  you,  lower!"  came  a  des- 


THE  TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR  SHIFT        79 

perate  command  to  the  "pull-up"  man  to  close  the 
furnace  doors. 

"  Get  out  —  " 

"  One  more  —  " 

"Up,  up,  goddam  it!  where  are  your  ears?" 

"Come  on,  men,  last  door." 

"My  shovel  you  son-of-a  —  ! " 

Now  they  were  tapping  on  Number  6.  The  melter 
came  out  of  his  shanty;  he  had  had  a  sleep  since  the 
last  furnace  tapped.  He  rubbed  his  eyes,  and  went 
out  on  the  gallery.  I  could  hear  his  "Heow."  Four 
poor  devils  were  standing  in  the  flame,  putting  in 
manganese.  Thank  God,  I  don't  shovel  for  Six. 

"A  jigger,"  from  Fred. 

"Sure." 

When  I  went  for  it,  the  sores  on  the  bottom  of  my 
feet  hurt,  so  that  I  walked  on  the  edges  of  my  shoes. 
I  was  so  delighted  with  the  idea  of  its  being  six  o'clock, 
with  no  back-walls  ahead,  that  I  almost  took  pleasure 
in  that  foot.  I  stopped  in  front  of  a  fountain  and  put 
my  right  arm  under  the  water. 

The  recorder  in  the  Bessemer  was  asleep.  He  was  a 
boy  of  twenty.  I  woke  him  up,  and  grinned  in  his  face. 

"Fifteen  thou'  for  Number  7." 

'You  go  to  hell,  with  your  goddam  Number  7! " 

I  grinned  at  him  again,  knew  it  was  just  the  long 
turn,  knew  he'd  give  me  that  fifteen  thousand  pounds; 
went  down  stairs  again  — 

Twenty  minutes  of  seven.  It 's  light.  Nobody 
talks,  but  everyone  dresses  in  a  hurry.  Everyone's 


8o  STEEL 

face  looks  grave  from  fatigue  —  eyes  dead.  We  leave 

at  ten  minutes  of  seven. 

/ 

7  A.  M.  Monday 

It's  a  problem  —  a  damn  problem  —  whether  to 
walk  fast  and  get  home  quick,  or  walk  slow  and  sort  of 
rest.  I  try  to  go  fast,  and  have  the  sense  of  lifting  my 
legs,  not  with  the  muscles,  but  with  something  else. 
I  shake  my  head  to  get  it  clearer.  One  bowl  of  oat- 
meal. Coffee.  "I  feel  all  right."  I  get  up  and  am 
conscious  of  walking  home  quietly  and  evenly,  with- 
out any  further  worry  about  the  difficulty  of  lifting 
my  feet.  "The  long  turns,  they  're  not  so  bad,"  I  say 
out  loud,  and  stumble  the  same  second  on  the  stairs. 
I  get  up,  angry,  and  with  my  feet  stinging  with  pain. 
Old  thought  comes  back:  "Only  seven  to  eight  hours 
sleep.  Bed.  Quick."  I  push  into  my  room  --  the  sun 
is  all  over  my  bed.  Pull  the  curtain;  shut  out  a  little. 
Take  off  my  shoes.  It 's  hard  work  trying  to  be  care- 
ful about  it,  and  it 's  darn  painful  when  I'm  not  care- 
ful. Sit  on  the  bed,  lift  up  my  feet.  Feel  burning  all 
over;  wonder  if  I'll  ever  sleep.  Sleep. 


VI 
BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP 

AT  the  end  of  every  shift,  when  I  walked  toward  the 
green  mill-gate  just  past  the  edge  of  the  power  house, 
I  could  look  over  toward  the  blast-furnaces.  There 
were  five  of  them,  standing  up  like  mammoth  cigars 
some  hundred  feet  in  height.  A  maze  of  pipes,  large 
as  tunnels,  twisted  about  them,  and  passed  into  great 
boilers,  three  or  four  of  which  arose  between  each  two 
furnaces.  These,  I  learned,  were  "  stoves  "  for  heating 
the  blast.  I  had  had  in  mind  for  several  days  asking 
for  a  transfer  to  this  interesting  apparatus.  There  was 
less  lifting  of  dead  weight  on  the  blast-furnace  jobs 
than  on  the  open-hearth.  Besides,  I  wanted  to  see  the 
beginning  of  the  making  of  steel  —  the  first  trans- 
formation the  ore  catches,  on  its  way  toward  becom- 
ing a  steel  rail,  or  a  surgical  instrument. 

I  went  to  see  the  blast-furnace  superintendent,  Mr. 
Beck,  at  his  house  on  Superintendent's  Hill. 

"I'm  working  on  the  open-hearth,"  I  said,  "and 
want  very  much  to  get  transferred  to  the  blast-fur- 
nace. I  intend  to  learn  the  steel  business,  and  want 
to  see  the  beginnings  of  things." 

"How  much  education?"  he  asked. 

"I  graduated  from  college,"  I  said,  "Yale  College." 
Would  that  complicate  the  thing,  I  wondered,  or 


82  STEEL 

get  in  the  way?  I  wanted  badly  to  sit  down  for  a  talk, 
tell  him  the  whole  story  —  army,  Washington,  hopes 
and  fears;  I  liked  him  a  good  deal.  But  he  was  in  a 
hurry  —  perhaps  that  might  come  on  a  later  day. 

We  talked  a  little.  He  said  I  ought  to  come  into  the 
office  for  a  while  and  "  learn  to  figure  burdens."  I 
replied  that  I  wanted  the  experience  of  the  outside, 
and  a  start  at  the  bottom. 

"All  right,"  he  said,  "I'll  put  you  outside.  Come 
Monday  morning." 

On  Monday  morning  I  followed  the  cindered  road 
inside  the  gate  for  three  hundred  yards,  turned  off 
across  a  railroad  track,  and  passed  a  machine-shop. 
The  concrete  bases  of  the  blast-furnaces  rose  before 
me.  Somebody  had  just  turned  a  wheel  on  the  side  of 
one  of  the  boiler-like  "stoves,"  and  a  deafening  blare, 
like  tons  of  steam  getting  away,  broke  on  my  ear- 
drums. I  asked  where  the  office  was. 

"Through  there." 

Up  some  steps,  over  a  concrete  platform,  past  the 
blaring  "stove,"  I  went,  to  the  other  side  of  the 
furnaces,  and  found  there  a  flat  dirty  building  —  the 
office.  Inside  was  Mr.  Beck,  who  turned  me  over  at 
once  to  Adolph,  the  "stove-gang  boss." 

I  was  a  little  anxious  over  this  introduction  to 
things,  and  thought  it  might  embarrass  or  prevent 
comradeships.  But  it  did  n't.  No  one  knew,  or  if  he 
did,  ever  gave  it  a  thought.  It  may  perhaps  have  ac- 
counted for  Adolph's  letting  me  keep  my  clothes  in 
his  shanty  that  night,  and  for  considerable  conver- 


BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP       83 

sation  he  vouchsafed  me  on  the  first  day.  But  my  in- 
dividuality passed  quickly,  very  quickly;  I  became  no 
more  than  a  part  of  that  rather  dingy  unit,  the  stove- 
gang. 

While  I  was  putting  on  my  clothes  in  Adolph's 
sheet-iron  shanty,  he  grinned  and  said:  "Last  time, 
pretty  dirty  job,  too,  eh?  " 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "open-hearth." 

He  led  me  out  of  the  shanty,  past  three  stoves,  up 
an  iron  staircase,  past  a  blast-furnace,  and  through  a 
"cast-house."  That  is  not  as  interesting  as  I  hoped. 
It  is  merely  a  place  of  many  ditches,  or  run-ways,  that 
lead  the  molten  iron  from  the  furnace  to  the  ladle. 
Very  little  iron  is  ever  "cast,"  since  the  blast-furnaces 
here  make  iron  only  for  the  sake  of  swiftly  transport- 
ing it,  while  still  hot,  to  the  Bessemer  and  open-hearth, 
for  further  metamorphosis  into  steel. 

We  came  at  last  to  more  stoves,  a  set  of  three  for 
No.  4  blast-furnace.  Near  the  middle  one  was  a  little 
group  of  seven  men,  three  of  them  with  a  bar,  which 
they  thrust  and  withdrew  constantly  in  an  open  door 
of  the  stove.  Inside  were  shelving  masses  and  gobs 
of  glowing  cinder. 

"You  work  with  these  feller,"  Adolph  said;  and 
passed  out  of  sight  along  the  stoves. 

I  watched  carefully  for  a  long  time,  which  was  a 
cardinal  rule  of  practice  with  me  on  joining  up  with  a 
new  gang.  It  was  best,  I  thought,  to  shut  up,  and 
study  for  a  spell  the  characters  of  the  men,  the  move- 
ments and  knacks  of  the  job.  I  think  this  reserve 


84  STEEL 

helped,  for  the  men  were  first  to  make  advances,  and 
before  the  day  was  out,  I  had  a  life-history  from  most 
of  them. 

"Where  you  work,  las'  job?  "  asked  a  little  Italian 
with  a  thin  blond  moustache,  after  he  had  finished  his 
turn  on  the  crowbar. 

"Open-hearth,"  I  said,  "third-helper." 

"I  work  three  week  open-hearth,"  he  said,  "too 
hot,  no  good." 

"Hot  all  right,"  I  said;  "how  's  this  job? " 

"Oh,  pretty  good,  this  not'ing,"  he  said;  "sometime 
we  go  in  stove,  clean  'em  up,  hot  in  there  like  hell. 
Some  day  all  right,  some  day  no  good." 

I  had  been  watching  the  stove,  and  caught  the 
simple  order  of  movements.  Two  or  three  men,  with 
long  lunging  thrusts,  loosened  the  glowing  cinder  in- 
side a  fire-box;  another  pulled  it  out  with  a  hoe  into  a 
steel  wheelbarrow;  another  dumped  the  load  on  a 
growing  pile  of  cinder  over  the  edge  of  the  platform. 
When  one  of  the  men  disappeared  for  a  chew,  I 
grabbed  the  wheelbarrow  at  hauling-out  time,  and 
worked  into  the  job. 

In  fifteen  minutes  that  fire-box  was  cleared  out,  and 
we  moved  to  the  next  stove.  We  skipped  that;  the 
door  was  locked  and  wedged.  I  learned  later  that,  if 
we  had  opened  it,  the  blast  (being  "on"  in  the  stove) 
would  in  all  likelihood  have  killed  us.  It  blows  out 
with  sufficient  pressure  to  carry  a  man  forty  yards. 
But  the  next  stove  we  tackled.  I  tried  the  thrusting 
of  the  bar  this  time.  The  trick  is  to  aim  well  at  a  likely 
crack,  thrust  in  hard  and  together,  and  with  all  the 


BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP       85 

weight  on  the  bar,  spring  it  up  and  down  till  the 
cinder  gives.  It  was  good  exercise  without  strain,  and 
so  cool  in  comparison  with  open-hearth  work  that  I 
took  real  joy  in  the  hot  cinder.  The  heat  was  compar- 
able to  a  wood  fire,  and  only  occasionally  was  it  neces- 
sary to  hug  close. 

We  did  five  stoves,  taking  the  wheelbarrow  with  us, 
and  carrying  it  up  the  steps,  when  we  passed  from  one 
level  to  another.  After  the  five  came  a  lull.  Two  of 
the  men  rolled  cigarettes,  the  rest  reinforced  a  chew 
that  already  looked  as  big  as  an  apple  in  the  cheek. 
For  both  these  comforting  acts  "Honest  Scrap"  was 
used,  a  tobacco  that  is  stringy  and  dark,  and  is  car- 
ried in  great  bulk,  in  a  paper  package. 

The  men  sat  on  steps  or  leaned  against  girders.  A 
short  Italian  near  me,  with  quick  movements,  and  full 
of  unending  talk,  looked  up  and  asked  the  familiar 
question,  "What  job  you  work  at  last  time?" 

"Open-hearth,"  I  said. 

"How  much  pay?  " 

"Forty-five  cents  an  hour." 

"No  like  job?" 

"No,  like  this  job  better,"  I  returned. 

He  paused.  Then,  "What  job  you  work  at  before 
open-hearth?  " 

"Oh,"  I  said,  "I  was  in  the  army." 

His  face  became  alert  at  once,  and  interested.  The 
others  stopped  talking,  also,  and  looked  over  at  me. 

"Me  have  broder  in  de  American  army;  no  in  army, 
myseP;  me  one  time  Italian  army.  How  long  time 
you?" 


86  STEEL 

"Nearly  two  years,"  I  said. 

"Oversea?" 

"Yes,  but  did  n't  get  to  front,  before  war  over.  No 
fight,"  I  answered,  adopting  the  abbreviated  style,  as 
I  sometimes  did.  It  seemed  unnecessary  and  a  little 
discourteous  to  use  a  rounded  phrase,  with  all  the 
adorning  English  particles. 

He  jumped  down  from  the  steps  and  took  up  a 
broom,  executing  a  shoulder  arms  or  two,  and  the  flat- 
hand  Italian  salute,  performed  with  a  tremendous  air. 

"Here,"  I  said,  "bayonet." 

I  took  the  broomstick,  and  did  the  bayonet  exer- 
cises. The  gang  stood  up  and  watched  with  delight, 
making  comments  in  several  languages.  Especially 
the  eyes  of  the  Italians  danced.  The  incident  left  a 
genial  social  atmosphere. 

Adolph  came  in  from  behind  one  of  the  stoves  as  I 
was  concluding  a  "long  point." 

"Come  on,"  he  said,  looking  at  me  with  a  grin;  and 
when  I  had  followed  him,  "I  show  you  furnace,  li'l 
bit." 

He  took  me  to  a  stair-ladder  near  the  skip  that  as- 
cended to  the  top  of  Number  5.  For  every  furnace,  a 
skip  carries  up  the  ore  and  other  ingredients  for  melt- 
ing inside.  It  is  a  funicular-like  thing,  a  continuous 
belt,  with  boxes  attached,  running  from  the  "hopper" 
at  the  top  of  the  furnace  to  the  "stockroom"  under- 
ground. 

We  started  to  climb  the  steps  at  the  left  of  the  belt. 
There  was  a  little  rail  between  us  and  the  moving 
boxes  of  ore. 


BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP       87 

"See  dat,"  said  Adolph,  pointing  through  at  the 
boxes.  "Keep  head  inside,"  he  said,  "keep  hand  in- 
side, cut  'em  off  quick."  He  illustrated  the  amputa- 
tion, with  great  vivacity,  on  his  throat  and  wrists. 

It  was  a  climb  of  five  minutes  to  the  furnace-top. 
We  paused  to  look  at  the  mounting  boxes. 

"Ore?  "I  asked. 

He  nodded. 

Pretty  soon  the  iron  ceased  coming,  and  a  white 
stone  took  its  place  in  the  boxes. 

"What's  that?" 

"Limestone,"  he  said.    "Next  come  coke.  Look." 

We  were  near  enough  to  the  top  to  see  the  boxes 
tilt,  and  the  hopper  open  and  swallow  the  dumping  of 
stone.  In  a  minute  or  two,  we  stepped  out  on  the  plat- 
form on  top  of  the  furnace. 

Adolph  looked  at  me  and  grinned.  "You  smell  dat 
gas?"  he  asked. 

I  nodded.  He  referred  to  the  carbon  monoxide  that 
I  knew  issued  from  the  top  of  all  blast-furnaces. 

"You  stay  li'l  bit,  pretty  soon  you  drunk,"  he  said. 

"Let's  not,"  I  returned. 

:<You  stay  li'l  bit  more,"  he  continued,  his  grin 
broadening,  "pretty  soon  you  dead." 

I  learned  in  later  days  that  this  was  perfectly  ac- 
curate. 

We  stood  on  a  little  round  platform  fifteen  or 
twenty  feet  across,  with  the  hopper  in  the  centre  gob- 
bling iron  ore  and  limestone.  A  layer  of  ore  dust,  an 
inch  thick,  covered  the  flooring,  and  a  faint  odor  of 
gas  was  in  the  air.  Each  of  the  other  five  furnaces  had 


88  STEEL 

a  similar  lookout,  and  a  narrow  passageway  connect- 
ed them  with  the  tops  of  the  stoves.  The  top  of  these 
gigantic  shafts  likewise  had  a  diameter  of  some  fifteen 
feet;  there  were  little  railings  about  them,  and  in  the 
centre  a  trapdoor. 

"What's  that  for?  "I  asked. 

"Go  inside  to  clean  'em  out,"  he  returned. 

I  wondered,  with  a  few  flights  of  imagination,  what 
that  job  would  be  like,  and  remembered  that  the 
Italian  with  the  blond  moustache  had  spoken  of  the 
duty  in  uncomplimentary  terms. 

We  could  look  forth  from  this  eminence  and  see  the 
whole  mill  yard,  which  was  nearly  a  mile  in  extent. 
Over  the  "gas  house"  —  a  large  building  I  hadn't 
noticed  before,  the  source  of  gas  for  the  open-hearth 
—  and  far  to  the  left,  were  the  Bessemers,  spouting 
red  gold  against  a  very  blue  sky.  On  their  right  rose 
the  familiar  stacks  of  the  open-hearth.  I  looked  in- 
tently at  them  and  wondered  what  Number  7  did  at 
that  moment  —  front-wall,  back-wall,  or  tapping  its 
periodic  deluge  of  hot  steel? 

In  the  foreground,  a  variety  of  gables,  and  then  the 
irregular  roof,  far  beyond,  that  I  knew  must  be  the 
blooming-mill,  because  of  the  interesting  yard  with  the 
muscular  cranes,  tossing  about  bars  and  shapes  and 
sheets  of  steel.  An  immense  system  of  railways  every- 
where, running  down  as  far  as  the  river  bank,  where 
were  piles  of  cinder,  and  a  trainload  of  ladles  moving 
there  to  dump.  A  half-mile  away  another  ironclad 
cluster  of  buildings,  the  tube  mill,  the  nail  mill,  and 
the  rest,  with  convenient  rails  running  up  to  them. 


BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP       89 

I  turned  around.  Near  by,  slightly  beyond  the  foot 
of  the  skips,  was  that  impressive  hill  of  red  dust,  the 
ore  pile.  Iron  ore  was  being  taken  away  for  the  skips 
with  one  of  those  spider-like  mechanisms  that  com- 
bine crane,  derrick,  and  steam-shovel.  It  was  built 
hugely,  two  uprights  forty  or  fifty  feet  high,  at  a 
distance,  I  estimate,  of  a  hundred  yards,  with  their 
bases  secured  to  railway  cars.  A  crossbeam  joined 
them,  which  was  itself  a  monorail,  along  which  a 
man-carrying  car  ran.  From  that  car  dropped  chains, 
attaching  themselves  at  the  bottom  to  the  familiar 
automatic  shovel  or  scoop. 

First  the  whole  arrangement  moved  —  the  up- 
rights, the  crosspiece,  and  the  monorail  car  —  very 
slowly  over  the  whole  hill  of  ore,  to  a  good  spot  for 
digging.  Then  the  monorail  car  sped  to  the  chosen 
position,  and  the  shovel  fell  rapidly  into  the  ore. 
With  a  mouthful  secure,  the  chains  lifted  a  little, 
enough  to  clear  the  remaining  ore,  and  the  car  ran 
its  mouthful  to  the  hill's  edge,  to  dump  into  special 
gondolas  on  railroad  tracks.  The  whole  gigantic  ore- 
hill  was  within  easy  reach  of  a  single  instrument. 

"Ought  to  last  a  while,"  I  said. 

"Will  be  gone  in  a  month,"  he  returned. 

We  went  down  the  ladder-steps,  and  stopped  near 
one  of  the  furnaces.  I  rather  hoped  the  stove-gang 
boss  would  talk.  He  did. 

"Ever  work  blast-furnace  before?"  he  began. 

"No,"  I  said;  "I  have  worked  on  the  open-hearth 
furnaces  a  little.  But  before  that  I  spent  about  two 
years  in  the  army." 


90  STEEL 

"Me  in  Austrian  army,"  he  said  musingly,  "fifteen 
year  ago.  Sergeant  artillery." 

I  thought  about  that,  and  it  occurred  to  me  that  he 
retained  something  of  the  artillery  sergeant  still,  neces- 
sarily adapted  a  little  to  the  exigencies  of  American 
blast-stoves.  I  found  he  knew  about  ordnance,  and 
boasted  of  Budapest  cannon-makers. 

"How  do  you  like  this  country? "  I  asked. 

"America,  all  right,"  he  said. 

"Good  country?"   I  pushed  him  a  little. 

"Mak'  money  America,"  he  explained;  "no  good 
live.  Old  country  fine  place  live." 

We  developed  that  a  little.  We  discussed  cities. 
He  asked  me  about  London  and  Paris,  and  other 
European  cities.  Which  did  I  like  best,  cities  over 
there  or  American  cities?  I  said  American  cities.  He 
asked  what  was  the  difference.  I  thought  a  minute, 
comparing  New  York  and  London.  European  cities 
did  not  have  the  impressive  forty-story  edifices  of 
American,  and  looked  puny  with  four  or  five. 

"Ah,"  he  said,  "tall  buildings  no  look  good.  Buda- 
pest good  city,  no  can  build  over  five  story." 

Here  was  unlooked-for  discrimination.  I  began  feel- 
ing provincial.  He  went  on  to  describe  the  cleanliness 
of  Budapest,  and  to  contrast  it  with  Pennsylvania 
cities  of  his  acquaintance.  He  certainly  had  me  hands 
down. 

He  continued:  "No  can  build  stack  that  t'row 
smoke  into  neighbor's  house.  Look  at  dis  place," 
he  said,  pointing  to  Bouton,  "look  at  Pittsburgh." 

I  said  no  more,  but  nodded  swift  agreement. 


BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP       91 

He  was  a  little  more  encouraging  about  the  United 
States  when  it  came  to  government. 

"You  have  a  man  president;  that  no  good,  after 
four  year  you  kick  him  out.  My  country  sometime 
get  king,  that 's  all  right,  sometime  get  damn  bad  one. 
No  can  kick  him  out." 

But  he  relapsed  into  censure  again  when  he  came  to 
American  women.  "Women,"  he  said,  "in  my 
country  do  more  work  than  men  this  country." 

' They  have  more  time,  here,"  I  said,  "and  don't 
have  to  work  so  hard." 

"American  women,  when  you  meet  'em,  always 
ask:  'How  much  money  in  de  pock? '  What  they  do? 
Dress  up,  —  hat,  dress,  shoe,  —  walk  all  time  Main 
Street.  Bah!" 

It  was  a  refreshing  shock  to  receive  this  outspoken 
critique  of  America  from  a  Hunky,  a  Hungarian 
stove-gang  boss  of  a  blast-furnace.  I  was  amused  very 
much  by  it,  except  the  phrase  "America  all  right 
mak'  money,  old  country  place  live."  I  coupled  it  up 
with  some  talks  I  had  had  with  men  on  the  open- 
hearth.  America,  steel-America,  which  was  all  they 
knew,  was  very  largely  a  place  of  long  hours,  gas,  heat, 
Sunday  work,  dirty  homes,  big  pay.  There  was  a  con- 
nection in  that,  I  thought,  with  the  gigantic  turnover 
figures  of  laborers  in  steel,  the  restless  moving  from 
job  to  job  that  had  been  growing  in  recent  years  so 
fast.  Too  many  men  were  treating  America  as  a  good 
place  for  taking  a  fortune  out  of.  The  impulse  toward 
learning  English,  building  a  home,  and  becoming 
American,  certainly  was  n't  strong  in  steel- America. 


92  STEEL 

But  I  left  these  questions  in  the  back  of  my  head,  and 
returned  to  the  stove  gang  at  Adolph's  command. 

In  a  few  days  I  was  well  in  the  midst  of  my  gang- 
novitiate.  We  got  formally  introduced  by  name  one 
day  in  front  of  No.  12  stove.  The  little  Italian  with 
the  black  moustache  said :  "  What 's  your  name  ?  " 

"Charlie,"  I  said,  knowing  that  first  names  were 
the  thing. 

"All  right,"  he  said,  "that's  Jimmy,  Tony,  Joe. 
Mike  not  here.  You  know  Mike?  Slavish.  John, 
that's  me.  That's  John  too  wid  de  bar.  —  Hey!  " 
with  an  arresting  yell,  that  made  the  others  look  up, 
"  Dis  is  Charlie!  " 


r 


I  became  a  part  of  an  exclusive  group  of  seven  men, 
who  had  worked  together  for  about  two  years.  There 
is  a  cohesiveness  and  a  structure  of  tradition  about 
a  semipermanent  mill-group  of  this  sort  that  marks 
it  off  from  the  casual-labor  gang.  The  physical  sur- 
roundings remain  unaltered,  and  methods  and  ways 
of  thought  grow  up  upon  them.  I  was  struck  by  the 
amount  of  character  a  man  laid  bare  in  twelve  hours 
of  common  labor.  There  are  habits  of  temper,  of  cun- 
ning and  strength,  of  generosity  and  comradeship,  of 
indifference,  that  it  is  capable  of  throwing  into  relief 
beyond  any  a  priori  reasoning.  It  begins  by  being  ex- 
tensively intimate  in  personal  and  physical  ways;  you 
know  every  man's  idiosyncrasies  in  handling  a  sledge 
or  a  bar  or  a  shovel,  and  the  expression  of  his  face 
under  all  phases  of  a  week's  work;  you  know  naturally 
the  various  garments  he  wears  on  all  parts  of  his  body. 


BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP       93 

You  proceed  to  acquaint  yourself,  as  the  work  throws 
up  opportunity,  with  the  mannerisms  and  qualities  of 
his  spirit.  It  is  astonishing,  with  the  barrier  of  a 
different  language,  only  partly  broken  down  by  a 
dialect-American,  how  little  is  ultimately  concealed 
or  kept  out  of  the  common  understanding.  _*~- 

I  was  impressed  by  the  precise  practices  established 
in  doing  the  work.  Every  motion  and  every  interval 
of  the  job  had  been  selected  by  long  trial.  If  you 
did  n't  think  the  formula  best,  try  it  out.  Many  con- 
siderations went  into  its  selection  —  to-day's  fatigue, 
to-morrow's,  and  next' month's.  It  had  an  eye  for  gas 
effect,  for  the  boss's  peculiar  character,  and  for  all 
material  obstacles,  many  of  which  were  far  from 
obvious. 

When  the  flue  dust  had  been  removed  from  the 
blast-stoves,  I  found  wheeling  and  dumping  it  an  easy 
and  congenial  set  of  movements,  and  consequently 
took  off  my  loads  at  a  great  speed. 

At  once  I  became  a  target.  "Tak'  it  eas'  —  What 's 
the  matter  with  you;  tak'  it  eas'." 

John  —  Slovene,  and  Stoic  —  put  in  an  explana- 
tion: "Me  work  on  this  job  two  year,  me  know;  take 
it  easy.  You  have  plenty  work  to  do." 

'Take  it  easy,"  I  said,  "and  no  get  tired,  eh?  feel 
good  every  day? " 

:'You  no  can  feel  good  every  day,"  he  amended 
quickly.  "Gas  bad,  make  your  stomach  bad." 

So  I  slowed  up  on  my  wheelbarrow  loads,  sat  on  the 
handles,  and  spat  and  talked,  till  I  found  I  was  going 
too  slow.  There  was  a  work-rhythm  that  was  neither 


94  STEEL 

a  dawdle  nor  a  drive;  if  you  expected  any  comfort  in 
your  gang  life  of  twelve  hours  daily,  you  had  best  dis- 
cover and  obey  its  laws.  It  might  be,  from  several 
points  of  view,  an  incorrect  rhythm,  but,  at  all  events, 
it  was  a  part  of  the  gang  mores.  And  some  of  its  in- 
ward reasonableness  often  appeared  before  the  day 
i  was  out,  or  the  month,  or  the  year. 


Everybody  wore  good  clothes  to  work,  and  changed 
in  the  shanty  to  their  furnace  outfit.  I  usually  came 
in  a  brown  suit,  which  had  been  out  in  the  rain  a  good 
many  times  and  was  fairly  shapeless.  One  day  I 
entered  the  mill  in  a  gray  suit,  which  fitted  and  was 
moderately  pressed. 

At  the  dinner-bucket  hour  in  the  shanty,  I  was 
asked  by  John  the  Italian:  "How  much  you  pay  for 
suit,  Charlie?" 

I  was  embarrassed,  fearing  vaguely  explanations 
that  might  have  to  follow  a  declaration  of  price.  I 
suddenly  recalled  the  fact  that  the  suit  had  been 
given  me  by  my  brother,  so  that  I  did  n't  know  the 
price,  and  said  so. 

"My  brother  give  me  suit,  I  don't  know  how  much 
he  pay,"  I  said.  That  dumped  me  into  another 
quandary. 

"What  job  your  brother  have?  "  I  was  immediately 
asked. 

I  thought  a  moment  and  answered  truthfully  again. 

"My  brother,  priest,"  I  said. 

That  arrested  immediate  attention,  and  I  was 
looked  at  with  respect  and  curiosity. 


BLAST-FURNACE  APPRENTICESHIP       95 

Tony  finally  said,  "  Why  you  no  be  priest,  Charlie  ? " 

"Oh,"  I  answered,  laughing,  "I  run  away;  I  like 
raise  hell  too  much  be  priest."  This  was  pretty  ac- 
curate, too. 

"O  Charlie!"  they  bellowed. 

After  that,  the  gang  were  friends  to  the  death. 


VII 
DUST,  HEAT,  AND  COMRADESHIP 

ONE  day  I  was  promoted  to  stove-tender  or  hot- 
blast  man  on  Number  6. 

The  keeper  of  the  furnace  was  a  negro.  When  he 
was  rebuilding  the  runways  for  the  tapped  metal,  I 
noticed  that  his  movements  were  sure  and  practised. 
He  patted  and  shaped  the  mud-clay  in  the  runway, 
like  a  potter  moulding  a  vessel.  When  it  was  tap  time, 
he  bored  the  tap  hole  with  the  electric  drill  easily  and 
neatly;  when  the  metal  flowed,  he  knew  the  exact 
moment  to  lift  the  gates  for  drawing  away  slag.  I 
watched  him  to  see  how  he  managed  the  four  white 
men  that  worked  for  him.  They  were  Austrians,  and 
I  found  they  joked  together  and  showed  no  resent- 
ment of  status.  Commands  were  given  with  a  nod  or 
gesture.  With  the  Americans  on  the  furnace,  the  re- 
lation was  the  traditional  one.  The  negro  was  light 
and  seemed  too  slightly  built  for  the  job,  but  he  per- 
formed it  very  efficiently,  and  so  did  his  gang. 

The  blower  was  Old  McLanahan,  a  man  somewhere 
between  thirty-five  and  sixty.  A  long,  successful  life 
of  inebriety  had  given  him  a  certain  resignation  to 
the  ills  of  man,  and  enabled  him  to  keep  the  heart  of  a 
viveur  throughout  his  life.  His  skin  appeared  thrown 
like  a  bag  over  an  assemblage  of  loosely  fitted  bones 


DUST,   HEAT,  AND   COMRADESHIP        97 

-  the  only  considerable  part  of  him  being  a  paunch 
which  coursed  forward  into  a  moderate  point. 

He  was  rather  proud  of  being  a  blower  on  furnace 
No.  6. 

After  the  slag  had  been  sampled  he  said:  " Where 
d'ye  eat,  boy?" 

"I  eat  at  Mrs.  Parrell's." 

"How  much?" 

"Seven  a  week." 

"Too  much.   Pretty  goddam  good  is  it?" 

"Damn  good  food,"  I  said. 

"Is  Mrs.  Farrell  a  widder  woman?" 

"No,"  I  said,  "she 'snot." 

"Well,"  he  said,  "if  you  hear  of  a  damn  fine  little 
widder  woman,  let  me  know  will  yer? " 

"Sure,"  I  said. 

"I'm  lookin'  for  a  place  ter  board,  and  most  of  all 
I'm  lookin'  for  a  little  widder  woman  ter  honor  wi4 
holy  matrimony." 

After  tapping  that  morning  at  8.00,  McLanahan 
took  a  silver  dollar  out  of  his  pocket.  "If  it  comes 
heads,"  he  said,  "I'm  goin'  out  to-night,  see,  I'm 
goin'  out  ter  find  a  woman." 

He  flipped  the  coin  and  it  fell  tails.  "Don't  count," 
said  he,  "two  out  of  three." 

This  flip  fell  heads. 

"Hah,"  he  said,  "if  this  comes  heads,  I'm  goin' 
out  to-night  ter  find  a  woman." 

It  fell  tails. 

"Hell! "  he  said,  "Don't  count,  flipped  it  with  the 
wrong  hand." 


98  STEEL 

He  kept  this  up  all  day.  Finally  at  5.30  the  coin 
came  heads.  He  picked  the  coin  up  and  put  it  in  his 
pocket. 

"Coin'  out,  to-night,"  he  said. 

"Boss  wants  to  keep  Number  6  lookin*  right.  Go 
down  below,  and  clean  out  all  that  flue  dust." 

I  shoveled  between  the  stone  arches  of  the  furnace 
base,  that  curved  overhead  like  the  culverts  of  a 
bridge.  Sometimes  the  flue  dust  was  wet  and  clotted 
with  mud,  and  came  up  in  cakes  on  the  shovel;  some- 
times it  was  light,  and  flew  in  your  nose  and  eyes.  I 
made  a  pile  of  it  six  feet  high,  and  shaped  it  into  a 
brick-red  pyramid  with  my  shovel.  I  washed  the 
arches  white  with  a  hose. 

"Change  'em  before  we  tap,"  McLanahan  ordered, 
nodding  at  the  stoves. 

I  went  among  the  rangy  hundred-foot  shafts  with  a 
certain  sense  of  control  over  great  forces.  Every  set 
differs  in  its  special  crankiness.  Number  9's  have  stiff- 
working  valves,  but  are  powerful  heaters ;  Number  8's 
are  cool  stoves,  but  their  valves  slide  genially  into 
place.  I  always  a  little  dreaded  "blowing  her  off." 
Resting  my  arms  on  the  edge  of  the  wheel,  and  grab- 
bing the  top  with  my  hands,  I  wrenched  it  over  to  the 
left,  and  the  blast  began.  The  immense  volumes  of 
compressed  air  escaped  with  a  gradually  accelerated 
blare.  I  gritted  my  teeth  a  little,  and  my  ears  sang. 

Then  came  "putting  on  the  gas."  I  climbed  to  a 
little  platform  near  the  combustion  chamber,  and  with 
a  hunk  of  iron  scrap  for  hammer,  knocked  out  some 


DUST,   HEAT,  AND   COMRADESHIP        99 

wedges  that  held  tight  a  door.  By  now  I  knew  just 
the  pressure  for  making  the  iron  slab  creep  on  its 
rollers.  I  braced  my  feet  and  pulled  with  back  and 
arms. 

Through  the  door,  the  combustion  chamber  glowed 
red.  I  went  down  the  steps  and  slowly  turned  the  gas- 
pipe  crank,  bringing  an  eight-inch  pipe  close  to  the  red 
opening.  I  dodged  the  back  flare  as  it  ignited. 

When  the  "new"  stove  was  on,  and  the  "old"  one 
lit  for  reheating,  I  went  to  the  pyrometer  shanty.  In 
a  little  hut  among  the  furnaces  were  tell-tale  discs, 
that  let  you  know  if  you  were  keeping  your  heat  right. 
I  found  my  heat  curve  was  smooth  with  only  a  tiny 
hump.  .  .  .  Two  Hunkies  were  inside  the  shanty. 

"Nine-thirty,"  said  one. 

"How  do  you  know?"  I  asked. 

He  pointed  to  the  end  of  the  curve  on  the  disc,  that 
was  opposite  the  9.30  mark  on  the  circumference. 

"Saves  me  a  watch,"  he  said,  with  a  grin. 

After  supper  that  evening,  I  mended  a  sleeve  of  my 
shirt  that  had  been  torn  on  a  piece  of  cinder  in  the 
cast-house.  Sounds  of  conversation  were  rising  from 
the  porch.  I  went  out  a,nd  found  Mr.  Farrell  sitting 
in  a  rocker  with  one  leg  on  the  railing  and  his  face 
screwed  into  an  attitude  of  thinking.  Mrs.  Farrell, 
having  done  the  dishes,  had  come  out  to  knit,  and  a 
lanky  visitor,  who  leaned  uncomfortably  against  the 
railing,  was  doing  the  talking.  The  conversation  was 
political. 

"Before  I  came  to  this  town,  nobody  had  the  guts 
to  vote  Democratic,"  said  the  visitor.  "I'm  from 


ioo  STEEL 

Democratic  parts,"  he  went  on,  "and  when  I  first 
come  here  I  used  to  go  round.  '  Come,  come,'  I  said, 
'you  fellers  is  Democrats,  you  know  you  is.  Sign  up.' 
'We  know  it,'  they'd  say,  'but  we  can't  afford  ter, 
there  's  the  wife  and  kids  —  we  can't  afford  ter,  we  Ve 
got  a  job  and  we  're  goin'  to  keep  it.'  That 's  how  bad 


it  was." 


'  You  mean  — " 

"I  mean  you  voted  with  the  Company  or  pretty 
quick  you  moved  out  of  Bouton,  for  you  had  n't  any 
job  to  work  at.  ...  I  used  ter  work  at  glass  blowin', 
that 's  a  real  business  —  " 

"Mr.  Herder  is  always  telling  us  how  much  better 
the  glass  business  is  than  the  steel  business,"  said 
Mrs.  Farrell.  "You  '11  have  to  get  used  to  that."  She 
gave  everybody  a  smoothing-out  smile. 

It  was  fun  when  you  could  pick  up  "dope"  in  the 
course  of  a  morning's  sweat.  I  learned  one  Sunday  a 
few  pointers  about  judging  conditions  through  the 
peepholes.  If  there  is  a  lot  of  movement,  your 
furnace  is  O.K.  If  the  cinder  begins  to  settle  into  the 
tuyere,  your  furnace  is  cold.  If  she  looks  reddish, 
cold;  blue,  O.K.  Don't  be  fooled  by  different  colored 
glasses  in  the  peepholes. 

One  day  we  kept  the  stoves  on  "all  heat"  for  the 
furnace  was  cold.  "All  you  can  give  her,  goddam 
'it,"  McLanahan  said,  looking  through  the  peepholes. 
McLanahan  was  always  a  little  ridiculous.  Anxiety 
made  him  hop  about  and  waddle  from  peephole  to 
peephole,  like  a  hen  looking  for  grain. 


DUST,   HEAT,   AND   COMRADESHIP       101 

I  heaved  on  the  hot-blast  chain,  and  the  indicator 
climbed. 

We  had  a  pleasant,  light  brown  chocolaty  slag,  that 
day,  which  meant  good  iron.  When  the  metal  runs 
out  with  large  white  speckles,  she  has  too  much  sul- 
phur; when  she  smokes,  you  '11  get  good  iron. 

The  other  day  they  had  too  large  a  load  of  ore  for 
the  coke  and  stone  in  her. 

"Sledge!"  yelled  the  keeper. 

A  cinder-snapper  brought  up  two,  and  held  the 
bar  while  the  keeper  and  first-helper  sledged.  They 
worked  well,  and  I  watched  with  fascination  the  ham- 
mer head  whirl  dizzily,  and  land  true  at  the  bar. 

At  last  the  liquid  slag  broke  through,  jet-black 
as  if  it  were  molten  coal,  flowing  thickly  down  the 
clay  spout.  The  clay  notch  was  hammered  and  eaten 
away,  and  had  to  be  remade. 

I  watched  the  stove-tender  on  Number  7  as  he 
opened  the  cold-air  valve.  His  motions  were  exactly 
calculated  —  the  precise  blow,  to  an  ounce,  to  loosen 
that  wedge. 

"How  long  have  you  been  sto ve- tender  ?"  I  asked. 

"Ten  years,"  he  said. 

"Go  down  to  the  stockroom  and  tell  the  skip-man, 
one  more  coke,"  said  McLanahan. 

I  was  glad  to  get  a  glimpse  of  that  part  of  the  blast- 
furnace operation.  Gondola  cars  bring  up  ore  and  the 
other  ingredients  of  blast-furnace  digestion,  and  run 
over  tracks  with  gaps  between  the  sleepers.  The  cars, 
by  means  of  their  collapsible  bottoms,  drop  the  loads 


IQ2      ,.  STEEL 

down  through,  and  the  material  falls  into  an  under- 
ground "stockroom." 

I  entered  it  by  climbing  down  two  ladders,  and 
found  the  skip-man  at  the  base  of  one  of  the  endless 
chains.  The  chamber  had  the  appearance  of  a  mine 
gallery  de  luxe.  I  looked  at  the  tons  of  ore  moving  up- 
ward neatly,  efficiently.  What  an  incalculable  saving 
of  labor  and  time,  this  endless  chain  affair  with  its  con- 
tinually moving  boxes,  over  the  old  manner  of  hoist- 
ing painfully,  in  few-pound  lots,  by  hand! 

I  gave  McLanahan's  order  to  the  skip-man  and 
went  up  the  ladders. 

You've  got  to  tap,  "when  the  iron's  right,"  and 
when  a  little  later  the  keeper  held  the  steam  drill  in 
front  of  the  mud  wall  of  the  tap  hole,  the  steam 
stayed  at  home.  There  was  no  time  for  a  steam-fitter. 

Young  Lonergan  and  I  beat  it  for  the  electric  drill. 
It  was  heavy  enough  to  make  us  waddle  as  we  carried 
it  on  the  run. 

"That's  bludy  funny,"  said  McLanahan.  The 
electric  drill  would  n't  electrify.  A  hurry  call  fol- 
lowed for  the  electrician.  He  smiled  benignly  while 
twelve  sweaty  men  looked  on.  And  in  thirty  seconds 
he  fixed  the  connection,  and  we  tapped  in  time  to  save 
the  iron. 

When  the  drill  had  almost  bored  through  the  hard 
mud  in  the  tap  hole,  the  keeper  shoved  in  a  crowbar, 
and  a  couple  of  helpers  sledged  rhythmically  for  one 
minute.  Then  the  molten  iron  broke  the  mud  into 
bits,  and  tumbled  out.  Little  sheets  of  flame  from  the 
slag  skated  along  the  top  of  the  red  river.  It  rose  in 


DUST,   HEAT,  AND   COMRADESHIP      103 

the  runway  with  bubbles  and  smoke  on  top.  The 
keeper  grabbed  a  scraper  —  an  exaggerated  hoe  — 
and  started  the  slag  through  a  side  ditch. 

"Now  try  it,"  said  Old  Mac. 

By  then,  I  had  the  test  spoon  ready,  scooped  up  a 
bubbling  ten  pounds,  carried  it  carefully,  and  poured 
it  into  two  moulds. 

When  I  had  broken  the  little  ingots,  still  red,  Mac 
said,  "Too  much  sulphur." 

By  now  the  metal  stream  had  run  to  the  edge  of  the 
cast-house  and  was  falling  spatteringly  into  a  ladle  ten 
feet  below. 

Somebody  said,  "Whoop!"  The  negro  keeper 
opened  the  iron  gate  of  a  new  runway,  and  the  metal 
rolled  on  its  way  to  a  second  ladle.  There  were  five 
to  fill,  each  on  a  railway  car.  I  noticed  the  switch 
engine  was  getting  ready  to  drag  the  trainload  of 
molten  metal  to  the  Bessemer. 

"Heow!"  out  of  Old  Lonergan's  throat.  The 
bottom  of  one  ladle  had  fallen  out  and  was  letting 
down  molten  iron  on  the  track.  There  was  nothing  to 
do  but  watch  it.  We  did  that.  It  covered  the  track 
like  a  red  blood-clot,  and  ran  off  sizzling,  and  curdling 
in  the  sand.  It  cooled,  blackened,  and  clotted  over 
one  rail  —  about  10,000  pounds. 

"Who  clean  dat  up?"  I  heard  a  Sicilian  cinder- 
snapper  say  with  a  blank  smile. 

After  the  furnaceful  of  metal  had  all  flowed  forth, 
we  prepared  to  plug  that  tap. 

I  went  over  to  the  other  side  of  the  tap  hole,  and 


104  STEEL 

picked  up  a  piece  of  sheet  iron.  A  shallow  puddle  of 
iron  was  still  molten  in  the  runway.  The  tap  hole  was 
crusting  over  with  cooling  iron,  still  aglow.  I  dropped 
the  sheet  iron  over  the  runway.  The  helpers  came  up 
behind  and  dropped  others. 

"Hey,  you,"  said  the  keeper  summoning  a  helper. 
They  swung  out  the  "mud  gun"  on  a  kind  of  crane 
and  pointed  its  muzzle  into  the  glowing  aperture.  It 
was  a  real  gun,  looked  like  a  six-inch  fieldpiece,  but 
fired  projectiles  of  mud  by  steam  instead  of  powder. 

"Quick,"  said  the  keeper. 

I  pushed  a  wheelbarrow  towering  with  mud  up  to 
the  sheet  iron;  then,  with  a  long  scoop-shovel  stand- 
ing against  the  furnace,  shoveled  mud  in  the  gun.  The 
keeper  stood  almost  over  the  runway  with  only  the 
rapidly  heating  sheet-iron  between  himself  and  the 
liquid-metal  puddle  beneath.  He  operated  a  little 
lever  that  shot  mud  charges  by  steam  into  the  hole. 
Every  time  he  shot  the  gun,  I  took  a  new  scoop  of 
mud.  We  worked  as  fast  as  our  arms  let  us.  Some  of 
the  helpers  kick  at  this  part  of  their  duties,  but  it  is 
cooler  by  several  degrees  than  the  open-hearth,  and 
thinking  of  those  sizzling  nights  lightens  it  for  me. 
Besides,  it  has  excitement  and  requires  a  streak  of 
skill. 

I  spent  several  days  with  young  Lonergan  helping 
the  water-tender,  Ralph. 

"Water  connections  damn  important  thing,"  said 
Lonergan.  I  was  beginning  to  see  why.  The  whole 
wall  of  the  great  cone-shaped  furnace  was  covered 


DUST,   HEAT,  AND   COMRADESHIP      105 

with  cooling  water-conduits.  Without  these  the  fur- 
nace would  melt  away. 

We  ranged  from  furnace  to  furnace,  climbing  up  to  a 
platform  that  ran  around  the  fattest  part  and  spend- 
ing long  quarter-hours  on  our  bellies  unscrewing 
valves.  There  was  always  something  leaking.  Ralph 
could  come  and  take  a  look  at  the  furnace,  and  send 
us  after  tools. 

"Ralph's  all  right,"  said  Lonergan,  "has  new 
names  though  for  everything.  •  Does  n't  call  a  goddam 
wrench  a  wrench,  calls  it  a  'jigger.'  Have  to  learn  all 
your  tools  over  again  by  his  goddam  Hunky  names." 

Young  Lonergan  was  very  "white"  to  me,  as  they 
say.  "I'll  show  you  how  to  clean  that  peephole." 
And  he  grabs  a  cleaning  rod,  and  imparts  the  knack 
of  knocking  cinder  out  of  that  important  little  ob- 
servation post. 

"I  used  to  work  stove-tender,"  he  explained. 

"If  you  want  to  know  anything  ask  Dippy,  he'll 
talk,  don't  McLanahan,  he  don't  know  he's  livin'. 
.  .  .  Have  a  chew?" 

"No,  I'll  smoke." 

One  day  we  had  been  discussing  the  bosses,  and  how 
they  had  got  their  start,  till  the  talk  drifted  to  young 
Lonergan  and  his  own  very  typical  career  of  youth. 

"Used  to  work  on  the  open-hearth,"  he  began.  "I 
used  to  test  the  metal  —  you  know  in  the  little  shanty 
where  'Whiskers'  is  now.  Chemist!"  he  grinned. 

"Then,  by  God,  I  went  to  work  in  the  blooming- 
mill,  chasing  steel  —  you  know;  keepin'  track  of  all 
the  ingots  comin'  in.  A  hell  of  a  job  —  by  God  you 


io6  STEEL 

did  n't  stop  a  second  —  you  knew  you'd  been  workin', 
boy,  when  you  pulled  out  in  the  mornin'.  I  worked 
my  head  off  at  that  job. 

"Then  I  fought  with  Towers.  He  gave  me  a  week. 
After  I  came  back  I  had  another  run-in.  .  .  .  When 
I  carried  my  bucket  out  o'  that  place,  I  was  off  work 
entirely.  Did  n't  go  to  work  for  three  months,  thought 
I  never  would  work  again. 

"  But  after  a  hell  of  a  spell,  gotta  job,  pipe  mill  New 
Naples  —  eight  hours  —  a  good  job,  but  the  mill's 
shut  down  now.  Then  the  suckers  drafted  me.  Bal- 
loon comp'ny  a  bloody  year  and  a  half." 

There  followed  a  very  vast  series  of  parties  in  the 
army,  and  explicit  views  on  all  the  officers  he  'd  had. 
There  was  usually  a  new  army  story  whenever  I  met 
him.  He  was  extraordinarily  clever  in  getting  away 
with  A.  W.  O.  L.'s. 

"When  I  got  my  discharge,  father  wanted  me  to 
come  to  work  here,  so  I  did.  Worked  on  those  stoves 
where  you  are,  for  a  while  —  stove- tender  helper,  then 
stove-tender.  Then  I  got  this  job.  .  .  .  Don't  you 
chew  ?  ...  I  '11  lose  it  too  if  I  take  many  more  days 
off  for  sickness.  Last  time  I  was  '  sick ' "  —  he  grinned 
—  "Bert  Cahill  and  the  bunch  and  I  took  three  skirts 
in  Bill's  car  to  Monaca.  -Had  six  quarts  of  damn  good 
whiskey.  I  was  out  a  week.  Ralph  says,  when  I  come 
back:  'Pretty  damn  sick,  you!'  But  to  hell  with  'em! 
I'm  not  afraid  of  my  job." 

That  little  blower  called  Dippy,  I  found,  knew  the 
furnace  game  in  all  its  phases  with  great  practical 


DUST,   HEAT,  AND   COMRADESHIP      107 

thoroughness.  I  used  to  try  to  get  chances  of  talking 
with  him  on  questions  of  technique. 

"What  about  those  jobs  in  the  cast-house?  "  I  said 
one  day,  "the  helper's  jobs?  Is  n't  it  a  good  thing  to 
know  about  those  if  you're  learning  the  iron  game? " 

"You  don't  want  to  work  there,"  he  said  quickly, 
"only  Hunkies  work  on  those  jobs,  they  're  too  damn 
dirty  and  too  damn  hot  for  a  'white'  man." 

So  I  got  thinking  over  the  "Hunky "  business,  and 
several  other  conversations  came  into  my  mind. 
Dick  Reber,  senior  melter  on  the  open-hearth,  had 
once  said,  "There  are  a  few  of  these  Hunkies  that  are 
all  right,  and  damn  few.  If  I  had  my  way,  I  'd  ship 
the  whole  lot  back  to  where  they  came  from." 

Then  I  thought  of  the  incident  of  my  getting 
chosen  from  the  pit  for  floor  work  on  the  furnaces. 
Several  times  Pete,  who  was  a  Russian,  discriminated 
against  me  in  favor  of  Russians.  Until  Dick  came 
along  and  began  discriminating  in  my  favor  against 
the  Hunkies. 

How  many  Hunkies  have  risen  to  foremen's  jobs, 
I  thought,  in  the  two  departments  'where  I  have 
worked  ?  One  in  the  open-hearth  —  a  fellow  who 
"stuck  with  the  company"  in  the  Homestead  Strike 
—and  none  on  the  blast-furnaces  except  Adolph,  the 
stove-gang  boss. 

My  recollections  were  broken  into  by  a  call  for 
violent  action. 

"Cooler,"  yelled  McLanahan,  his  voice  going  up 
into  a  husky  shriek. 

That  meant  molten  iron  inside,  melting  the  cone- 


io8  STEEL 

shaped  water-chamber  around  the  blast  pipe.  If  let 
alone,  the  cooling  at  that  place  would  cease,  and  in  a 
short  time  there  would  follow  an  escape  of  molten 
metal. 

" Cooler !  "  yelled  on  a  blast-furnace  means  "Hurry 
like  hell." 

I  grabbed  a  wrench  to  take  the  nut  off  the  "bridle" 
—  the  first  step  in  taking  out  a  sort  of  outside  cooler, 
the  tuyere. 

"Bar,"  said  the  Serbian  stove-tender  very  quietly, 
picking  up  a  specially  curved  one,  and  McLanahan 
took  the  other  end. 

Somebody  knocked  out  some  keys  with  a  sledge, 
and  the  blowpipe  fell  on  the  curved  bar,  making  the 
holders  of  it  grunt.  They  took  it  off  fast,  for  the 
instant  the  thing  loosens,  a  flame  shoots  through  the 
hole  and  licks  its  edges. 

Then  the  tuyere  comes  loose  with  a  few  strokes  of 
a  pull  bar.  All  of  these  moves  are  fast;  a  tuyere 
goes  bad  every  other  day  and  men  work  fast  like 
soldiers  at  a  gun  drill. 

But  coolers  don't  break  a  lead  but  once  in  three 
months  or  so;  and  the  cone 's  heavier,  the  gang  bigger, 
there  's  less  efficiency  and  more  holler  and  sweat. 

When  the  pull  bar  gets  into  action  it  looks  a  little 
like  a  mediaeval  mob  with  a  battering  ram.  A  "pull 
bar"  is  a  tool  designed  to  translate  the  muscle  of 
many  men  into  pull,  on  a  small  gripping  edge  against 
which  sledging  is  impossible.  At  one  end  a  thick  hook 
grips  the  edge  of  the  cooler,  at  the  other  a  weight  is 
brought  against  a  flange  that  runs  around  the  bar. 


DUST,   HEAT,   AND   COMRADESHIP      109 

Everybody  on  the  gang  has  a  piece  of  a  rope  attach- 
ing to  that  weight. 

The  stove  gang  moving  between  stoves  Thirteen 
and  Fourteen  were  caught  and  brought  into  this  for 
muscle,  and  a  couple  of  passing  millwrights  drafted. 

"Hold  up  the  goddam  end,"  from  Steve,  boss  by 
common  consent. 

"A  little  beef  this  time!"  from  a  blower.  "What 
the  hell 's  the  matter,  sick  ?  " 

We  all  swear  between  breaths,  and  take  a  grip 
higher  on  the  rope  —  the  weight  cracks  the  flange 
again,  and  makes  the  bar  shiver. 

When  the  new  cooler,  which  resembles  more  nearly 
a  gigantic  flower  pot,  without  any  bottom,  than 
anything  else,  is  in  place,  there's  a  cry  of:  "Big 
Dolly!" 

That  involves  four  or  five  men,  lifting  a  kind  of 
ramrod  with  a  square  hammer-end,  from  the  rack, 
and  lugging  it  to  the  cooler. 

I  get  near  the  ramming  end  this  time;  Tony  is  near 
me  on  the  other  side.  Together  we  hold  the  hammer 
against  the  cooler.  As  the  end  strikes,  the  jar  goes 
back  through  the  men's  hands. 

"Now  top." 

Arms  raise  the  bar  painfully,  and  hold  it  poised  a 
little  unsteadily,  sway  back,  tense,  and  drive. 

"Hold  it,  hold  it  on  the  cooler,  goddam  you." 

Tony  and  I  had  let  our  arms  shake  a  fraction,  and 
the  hammer  fell  glancing  on  the  cooler's  edge. 

"Now!" 

Seated  this  time.   Arms  relax  and  stretch. 


i  io  STEEL 

When  things  are  ready,  Adolph  makes  the  water 
connections. 

"Hold  de  goddam  shovel,  what  you  t'ink,  I  burn 
up." 

A  cinder-snapper  holds  a  shovel  in  front  of  the  hole 
to  keep  the  flame  from  his  hands. 

"All  right,  all  right." 

The  job  's  done;  the  millwrights  pick  up  their  tools, 
and  the  stove  gang  moves  off  leisurely  to  their  clean- 
ing. I  hear  the  superintendent  talking  with  a  blower 
near  the  sample  box. 

"They  did  that  in  pretty  good  time,"  he  says. 

I  used  to  eat  my  lunch  and  kept  my  clothes  in  a 
little  brick  shanty  near  Number  4,  sharing  it  with  the 
Italians  of  the  stove  gang.  Although  by  the  bosses' 
arrangement  it  was  a  mixed  gang,  Italian  and  Slav, 
the  mixture  did  not  extend  to  shanty  arrangements, 
and  race  lines  prevailed.  I  felt  that  I  should  learn  low 
Italian  in  a  few  weeks  if  I  continued  with  this  group; 
the  flow  of  it  against  my  ear  drums  was  incessant  and 
some  of  it  had  already  forced  an  entrance.  Besides  I 
was  learning  a  great  deal  about:  how  to  live,  what  to 
wear  on  your  head,  on  your  feet,  and  next  your  skin ; 
where  to  get  it  —  good  material  to  resist  the  blast- 
furnace, and  cheap  as  well;  wisdom  in  eating  and 
drinking,  and  saving  money,  in  resting,  in  working,  in 
getting  a  job  and  keeping  it. 

There  was  a  whole  store  of  industrial  mores.  In 
some  respects  the  ways  of  living  of  these  workmen 
seemed  as  rooted  and  traditional  as  the  manners  of 


DUST,   HEAT,  AND  COMRADESHIP      in 

monarchs,  and  as  wise.  I  won  considerable  merit, 
when  I  brought  in  a  kersey  cap  that  I  got  for  seventy- 
five  cents,  and  lost  much  when  I  reluctantly  admitted 
the  price  of  my  brown  suit. 

Everyone  on  the  gang  performed  the  washing  up 
after  work  with  the  greatest  thoroughness  and  success. 
They  devoted  minute  attention  to  the  appearance  of 
clothes  worn  home.  Rips  and  holes  got  a  neat  patch 
at  once,  and  shoes  were  tapped  at  the  proper  period  — 
before  holes  appeared.  I  have  seen  only  one  or  two 
men  in  the  mill  who  were  not  clean  in  their  going- 
home  clothes. 

I  talked  to  John  one  day  on  the  subject  of  neat- 
ness. He  asked,  "You  have  to  clean  up  good  in  the 
army? " 

I  dilated  on  the  necessity  of  policing  when  wearing 
khaki. 

He  said:  "Man  that  no  look  neat,  no  good.  I  no 
like  him,  girls  no  look  at  him.  Bah!" 

I  was  almost  always  offered  some  food  from  the 
bursting  dinner  buckets  of  my  friends:  a  tomato, 
some  sausage,  a  green  pepper,  some  lettuce  and  cu- 
cumbers. I  accepted  gladly  for  it  was  always  superior 
to  my  restaurant  provender. 

Tony  told  me  one  day  that  Jimmy  had  come  over 
"too  late  from  old  country,  to  learn  speak  English 
and  be  American."  He  was  thirty-one  years  old. 
He  was  going  back  this  Christmas.  And  Tony  was 
going  too,  but  just  for  a  visit.  They  were  going  to 
Rome.  We  had  talked  it  over  a  good  many  times,  all 
Italy  in  fact,  people,  women,  farms.  Tony  turned  to 


H2  STEEL 

me:  "You  come  Italy  with  Jimmy  and  me  this 
Christmas?  We  go  see  Rome." 

I  assented  quickly,  wishing  I  somehow  could,  and 
was  extraordinarily  proud  of  that  invitation. 

I  must  not  forget  the  occasion  of  the  green  pepper. 
One  noon  I  sat  beside  Jimmy  during  the  lunch  hour. 
The  whole  Italian  wing  were  together,  sitting  on 
benches  in  the  brick  shanty.  Jimmy  reached  among 
the  loaves  of  bread  in  his  bucket,  and  hauled  out  a 
green  pepper  as  big  as  an  orange.  He  offered  it  to  me 
and  I  accepted. 

Treating  it  like  my  old  friends  the  stuffed  peppers, 
I  bit  deep.  The  whole  shanty  watched  eagerly  for 
results.  I  had  n't  reckoned  its  raw  strength  and  in- 
stantly felt  like  a  blast-furnace  on  all  heat.  Despite  all 
efforts  I  could  n't  keep  my  face  in  shape,  or  resist 
putting  out  the  fire  with  the  water  jug.  The  pleasure 
I  furnished  the  Roman  mob  was  enormous. 

After  that  I  learned  to  eat  green  peppers  rationally 
and  agree  with  my  friends  that  they  are  beneficial. 
Beyond  their  health  qualities  they  have  an  economic 
justification.  With  their  help  you  can  make  a  meal  of 
cheap  dry  bread.  Plain  and  unbuttered  it  costs  you 
but  six  cents  a  half  loaf  which  is  a  full  meal,  and  hot 
green  peppers  will  compel  you  to  stow  it  away  in  self- 
defense.  As  Tony  phrases  it: — 

"Pepper,  make  you  eat  bread  like  hell! " 

Tony  thinks  that  Americans  eat  too  much  that  is 
sweet;  it  makes  them  logy  and  sleepy.  I  think  he  is 
right.  Joe  claims  that  the  people  in  America  do  not 
know  how  to  make  bread;  the  wheat  he  says  is  cut 


DUST,   HEAT,  AND   COMRADESHIP      113 

when  it  is  too  green.  The  gang,  of  course,  bring 
Italian  bread  in  their  buckets.  It  is  certain  that  the 
American  lunch  of  a  soggy  sandwich  and  piece  of 
pie  leaves  a  man  heavy  for  the  afternoon.  The 
average  dinner  bucket  in  the  shanty  contains:  a  loaf 
of  bread,  a  piece  of  meat,  —  lamb,  beef,  chicken,  or 
sausage, -- three  or  four  green  peppers,  a  couple  of 
tomatoes,  a  bunch  of  grapes,  and  some  vegetable 
mixture  like  tomatoes  chopped  with  cucumbers  and 
lettuce. 

One  day  the  gang  got  absorbed  in  stunts,  climbing 
a  ladder  with  the  hands,  giving  a  complete  twist  to  a 
hammer  with  grip  the  same,  the  usual  turning  trick  of 
a  broomstick  held  to  the  floor,  etc.  My  contribution 
was  squatting  slowly  on  the  right  leg  with  the  left 
stiff  and  parallel  with  the  floor.  John  complained  of  a 
lame  thigh  for  three  days  after,  I  am  gratified  to  say. 

With  Tony  I  occasionally  picked  a  wrestling  quar- 
rel; he  has  a  terrific  grip  and  one  day  very  nearly 
squeezed  the  life  out  of  me  in  a  fit  of  playfulness.  I 
called  him  "Orso"  afterward  for  his  squeezing  at- 
tribute. Tony's  make-up  includes  a  sense  of  humor. 
One  day  when  he  had  rolled  about  on  the  floor  in  front 
of  Number  3,  he  said:  "Ain't  you  'shamed,  Charlie, 
you  young  man,  fight  old  man  like  me.  You  twenty- 
two,  twenty-three,  me  thirty-seven!" 

Tony  could  put  me  beyond  this  vale  of  tears  with 
his  left  hand. 


VIII 
I  TAKE  A  DAY  OFF 

I  DECIDED  on  a  day  off.  John  had  lately  taken  one 
for  the  festival  at  New  Naples,  and  had  come  in  to 
work  the  next  morning  with  the  wine  still  at  festivals 
in  his  head.  Sitting  atop  the  blast-furnaces  the  other 
day,  looking  at  the  blue  rivers  and  the  three  hills,  and 
speculating  about  men  going  down  to  the  sea  in  ships 
—  because  of  the  fat  river-boat  we  could  see  —  had 
made  me  sicken  of  the  smell  of  flue-dust.  I  decided  to 
take  a  day  off. 

Sometimes  the  foreman,  when  you  got  back  after 
cutting  a  turn,  would  say,  "I  don't  believe  you  want 
this  job ;  you  like  loafing  better;  I  '11  give  it  to  Jimmy." 
But  with  a  seven-day  week,  only  the  mean  ones 
hollered.  Men  took  an  occasional  holiday. 

I  ate  breakfast  with  a  very  conscious  leisure  at 
George's,  putting  down  scrambled  eggs,  at  8.00 
o'clock,  instead  of  the  coffee  and  toast  at  5.15  A.M. 

"No  work  to-day,"  said  George;  "lotza  mon', 
eh?" 

"Wrong,  "said  I. 

"Mebbe  you  see  best  girl  to-day." 

"Guess  again." 

"Married?" 

"No." 


I  TAKE  A  DAY  OFF  115 

"Mr.  Vincent's  wife  is  sick,"  said  George,  changing 
the  subject. 

"Oh,  I  'm  sorry." 

"He  no  work  to-day;  come  in  here  for  breakfast, 
ten  minutes  before  you." 

Vincent  was  a  young  American,  twenty-one  or  two, 
whose  brother  I  had  known  in  college.  He  had  not 
gone  himself,  but  took  a  straw  boss's  job  in  the  pipe 
mill.  He  had  married  six  months  before,  and  his  wife 
lived  with  him  in  two  rooms  in  Bickford  Lodge  —  the 
other  hotel  in  Bouton.  We  went  to  the  movies  to- 
gether sometimes,  and  often  met  for  supper  at  the 
Greek's. 

I  looked  for  Vincent,  and  found  him  reading  the 
"Saturday  Evening  Post"  in  the  front  room. 

"Elizabeth  is  sick,"  he  explained.  "I'm  sticking 
around  to-day." 

We  fell  to  talking  mill. 

"What  hours  do  you  work  now?"  I  asked. 

"Six  to  six." 

"You  get  up  at  five." 

"Yes,  about  that." 

'That 's  not  true,  Philip,"  came  over  the  transom 
from  the  sick  room.  "I  set  the  alarm  at  four-thirty, 
Phil  sleeps  till  five-thirty,  drinks  one  cup  of  coffee, 
leaves  his  eggs,  and  catches  the  twenty-of-six  car." 

:'You  now  have  the  story,"  said  Phil.  "It's  a 
stinking  long  day,  is  n't  it?" 

"Phil  has  it  all  figured  out,"  Elizabeth  shouted 
from  the  back  room.  "  From  six  to  nine,  he  pays  his 
rent  —  " 


ii6  STEEL 

"Yes,  I've  figured  it  that  way,"  he  said.  "The 
money  I  earn  between  nine  and  one  is  enough  to  pay 
my  day's  board  and  my  wife's;  one  to  three  is  clothes 
and  shoes ;  three  to  five,  all  other  expenses ;  five  to  six 
I  work  for  myself!" 

"That 's  bully;  I  think  I  '11  figure  mine." 

"But  there  aren't  any  evenings,  are  there,"  he 
went  on,  "or  any  Sundays?" 

Suddenly  he  looked  up  at  the  chandelier.  "See  all 
the  pipes  in  that,"  he  said;  "I  find  pipes  and  tubes 
everywhere,  since  I  've  worked  in  the  mill.  It  's  darn 
interesting  to  pick  them  out.  The  radiator  in  this 
room  is  made  of  pipe,  see;  the  bed  in  the  back  room; 
notice  those  banisters  outside.  I  see  them  everywhere 
I  look.  If  I  had  a  little  money,  I  'd  put  it  in  a  pipe  mill. 
?S  money  in  that  game,  once  you  get  the  market; 
Coglin  and  I  have  it  all  doped  out." 

For  fifteen  minutes,  Phil's  enthusiasm  for  pipe- 
manufacture  built  the  mills  of  the  future. 

Toward  noon  I  went  to  George's.  The  pit  crane- 
man,  Herb,  was  there,  eating  George's  roast  beef  and 
boiled  potato,  and  looking  half  asleep. 

"I '11  fire  you,"  I  said. 

"I'm  on  nights  this  week,"  he  returned,  with  a 
slow  smile;  "I  could  n't  sleep,  so  I  thought  I'd  get 
up  and  eat  some.  Besides,  I  've  got  to  go  to  the  bank. 
You  're  with  the  blast-furnaces  now,  huh?  " 

"Yes." 

"Like  'em?" 

"Yes,  I  think  I  '11  like  blast-furnace  work,"  I  said 


I   TAKE  A   DAY  OFF  117 

"if  I  get  to  be  stove-tender  or  something.  Good  boss, 
Beck." 

"They  say  so.  Pete's  as  crabby  as  ever  in  our 
place.  He  fired  one  of  the  second-helpers  last  week, 
Eric  —  d  'you  know  him  ?  Used  to  come  in  drunk 
every  day,  worked  for  Jock  on  Eight." 

"That's  too  bad,"  I  said;  "he  gave  everyone  a 
good  time.  Let  me  tell  you  how  I  amuse  the  gang  on 
the  blast-furnace.  You  know  the  way  they  break  in- 
gots for  a  test  on  the  open-hearth? " 

"Yes." 

"It's  not  like  that  with  us.  I  gave  everybody  on 
Five  a  treat  because  I  thought  it  was." 

Herb  looked  interested. 

"Of  course,  on  the  open-hearth  you  pick  them  up 
with  a  tongs,  when  they  're  red-hot,  and  cool  them  in 


water." 


Herb  nodded. 

"So  there  are  always  halves  of  test-ingots  on  the 
floor,  cold.  On  the  blast-furnace  the  stove-tender 
pours  the  test  and  knocks  it  out  of  the  mould.  Iron 
breaks  easier  than  steel,  so  he  never  bothers  to  cool 
the  ingot,  but  breaks  it  red-hot.  Last  Wednesday  I 
wander  up  from  the  stoves  when  the  furnace  is  ready 
to  tap.  The  blower  kicks  busted  halves  of  a  test-ingot 
out  of  the  way,  and  somebody  says,  '  A  little  too  much 
sulphur.'  I  'm  ambitious  to  learn  iron  smelting,  too, 
and  think  I  '11  study  the  fracture.  I  walk  in  front  of 
the  blower  and  pick  up  the  test." 

Herb  grinned. 

"It  was  n't  red-hot,"  I  went  on;   "but  it   had 


n8  STEEL 

blackened  over — just.  I  dropped  it,  and  snapped 
my  hand  three  feet  behind  me.  The  blower,  the  stove- 
tender,  the  first,  second,  and  third  helpers,  and  the 
assistant  superintendent,  who  were  all  gathered,  en- 
joyed the  thing  all  over  the  place  for  several  minutes. 
It  gave  them  a  good  time  for  the  afternoon." 

When  I  left  Herb,  I  took  a  walk  through  the  Greek 
and  Slavic  quarters,  and  stopped  a  while  on  Superin- 
tendent's Hill,  to  study  the  graded  superiority  of  fore- 
men and  superintendents.  There  were  excellent  little 
houses  here,  though  too  young  and  new  to  express 
any  other  character  than  moderate  prosperity.  Per- 
haps it  was  an  ungracious  thing  to  demand  more. 

I  walked  on,  past  farms,  and  up  and  down  consider- 
able hills.  I  lay  down  on  the  ground,  in  high  grass, 
under  apple  trees  which  were  near  a  tumble-down 
stone  wall.  It  was  enormously  satisfactory  to  lie  in 
the  high  grass,  under  an  apple  tree,  listening  to  the 
small  August  noises  —  for  a  swift  hour  and  a  half. 

After  supper,  I  wanted  badly  to  take  a  look  at 
furnace  fires  against  a  night  sky,  and  stepped  out 
alone  to  do  it.  Close  to  the  railroad  station  I  set  foot 
on  the  hill,  and  climbed  past  a  Greek  hotel  and  stag- 
gering tenements  to  a  ridge.  From  there  I  could  look 
over  multitudinous  roofs  to  the  flat  spaces  by  the 
river,  where  the  mills  roared  and  shone. 

I  heard  heavy  things  dropped  here  and  there  over 
acres  of  plate  flooring;  they  melted  into  a  roar.  The 
even  whirr  of  the  power  house  increased  it,  and  the 
shrieks  of  machinery  gave  it  a  streaky  quality.  There 
were  staccato  punctuations,  of  course,  by  the  whistles, 


I  TAKE  A  DAY  OFF  119 

and  when  a  distant "  blaw  "  came  to  me,  I  thought  how 
loudly  it  drove  into  the  ears  of  the  hot-blast  man, 
turning  his  wheel  by  a  stove.  But  it  was  mostly  the 
summed-up  roar  that  occupied  your  head  —  an  in- 
sistent thing,  that  made  you  excited  and  weary  at  the 
same  time.  The  mills  had  been  running  for  ten  years; 
they  always  had  a  night-shift  in  Bouton. 

It  is  easy  to  get  excited  about  a  steel-mill  sky  at 
night.  I  like  to  look  at  them.  There  were  n't  many 
lights  at  the  nail  mill  but  just  enough  to  show  broken 
outlines  of  a  sheet-iron  village  there.  The  rolling-mills 
gave  some  of  the  brightness  of  hot  billets  through  the 
windows,  and  over  the  stacks  of  the  open-hearth  were 
sparks.  By  closing  my  eyes,  I  could  see  curdling  flame 
in  the  belly  of  Number  7.  The  open-hearth  fires 
showed  themselves,  a  confused  glow  under  a  tin  roof. 

Some  little  light  came  on  the  mills  out  of  the  night 
itself,  though  thin  clouds  kept  washing  the  face  of  the 
moon,  and  now  and  then  a  blast-furnace  got  into  the 
moonlight  and  looked  perfectly  confused  with  its  pipe 
labyrinth  and  its  stoves. 

From  where  I  stood,  I  could  see  the  Bessemer  con- 
verter pouring  a  fluid  rope  of  white  light;  I  knew  it  for 
a  stream  the  thickness  of  a  hydrant.  A  rusty,  glowing 
cloud  rose  over  the  converter,  changing  always,  and 
turning  that  patch  of  sky  into  gold.  The  pattern  of 
smoke  the  blower  knows  like  a  textbook,  and  follows 
the  progress  of  his  steel  by  the  color  of  the  cloud. 

My  mind  swept  over  many  memories  as  I  looked  at 
the  yellow  fire  of  the  Bessemers.  There  was  no  order 
or  arrangement  in  them.  They  were  a  stream,  thick 


120  STEEL 

in  some  passages,  shallow  in  others,  with  scraps  of  all 
sorts  riding  over  the  top.  One  scrap  was  the  price  the 
Wop  cobbler  charged  for  soling,  and  another,  Dick's 
words  when  he  damned  me  for  forgetting  a  bag  of 
coal.  Then  there  were  things  that  wrung  me  and 
made  the  palms  of  my  hands  wet,  as  if  thoughts  went 
over  nerves  and  not  brain. 

I  looked  over  at  the  eight  stacks  of  the  open-hearth, 
closed  my  eyes,  and  saw  Seven  tapping.  The  second- 
helper  broke  the  mud  stoppage  with  his  "picker,"  and 
liquid  steel  belched.  Pete  held  up  two  fingers.  Stanley 
the  Pole  was  third-helper  with  me.  We  shoveled  in 
the  two  piles.  I  could  feel  heat  in  my  nose  and  throat 
and  sparks  light  on  the  blue  handkerchief  I  had  tied 
around  my  neck.  We  cooled  off  in  a  breeze  between 
the  two  furnaces,  and  as  we  caught  our  breath, 
watched  Herb  swing  the  ladleful,  over  the  moulds 
for  pouring. 

I  lived  through  the  dragged  hours  in  the  morning  of 
a  long  turn.  Between  two  and  four  is  worst  —  I 
remembered  " fixing  the  spout"  with  Nick  at  three  — 
wheelbarrow  loads  of  mud  and  dolomite  —  a  pitched 
battle  with  sleep  — 

At  intervals  in  my  memories,  I  grew  conscious  of 
the  steady  roar  the  mills  sent  me  from  the  river;  then 
forgot  it,  quite. 

Finished  ladles  of  iron  came  into  mind,  and  I  tried 
to  follow  in  the  dark  the  path  they  would  take  along 
tracks  to  the  Bessemer.  Thick  red  ingots  of  steel,  big 
as  gravestones,  I  knew,  were  coming  from  "soaking 
pits"  to  rolls,  and  getting  flattened  into  blooms  and 


I   TAKE  A   DAY  OFF  121 

billets.  I  could  see  trainloads  of  even  steel  shapes 
moving  out  of  the  freight  yard  to  become  the  steel 
framework  of  the  world. 

"It  is  perfectly  certain  that  civilization  is  kept 
from  slipping,  by  a  battle,"  I  said  to  myself,  begin- 
ning a  line  of  thought. 

An  express  train  shot  into  view  in  the  black  valley 
at  my  feet,  and  passed  the  Bouton  station,  with  that 
quickly  accelerating  screech  that  motion  gives.  I 
thought  of  the  steel  in  the  locomotive,  and  thought 
it  back  quickly  into  sheets,  bars,  blooms,  back  then 
into  the  monumental  ingots  as  they  stood,  fiery  from 
the  open-hearth  pouring,  against  a  night  sky.  Then 
the  glow  left,  and  went  out  of  my  thinking.  Each  in- 
got became  a  number  of  wheelbarrow  loads  of  mud, 
pushed  over  a  rough  floor,  Fred's  judgment  of  the 
carbon  content,  and  his  watching  through  furnace 
peepholes.  The  ladlefuls  ceased  as  steel,  becoming 
thirty  minutes'  sledging  through  stoppage  for  four 
men,  the  weight  of  manganese  in  my  shovel,  and  the 
clatter  of  the  pieces  that  hit  the  rail,  sparks  on  my 
neck  burning  through  a  blue  handkerchief,  and  the 
cup  of  tea  I  had  with  Jock,  cooked  over  hot  slag  at 
4.00  A.M. 

A  battle  certainly,  to  make  an  ingot  —  trench  work 
in  a  quiet  sector,  perhaps,  but  a  year-after-year  affair. 
The  multiform  steel  prop  which  civilization  hung 
upon  came  to  me  for  a  moment  —  rails,  skyscrapers, 
the  locomotive  just  passed,  machinery  that  was  mak- 
ing the  ornament  and  substance  of  the  environment 
of  men.  It  rested  on  muscle  and  the  will  to  push 


122  STEEL 

through  "long  turns,"  I  thought.  It  could  slip  so 
easily.  A  huge  mistaken  calculation :  not  enough  coal 
or  cars  to  carry  it.  Or  what  if  the  habitual  movements 
of  the  muscles  were  broken,  or  the  will  fallen  into  dis- 
temper ?  Suppose  men  thought  it  not  worth  the  can- 
dle, and  stopped  to  look  on? 

Were  we  to  get  more  of  the  kind  of  civilization  we 
knew,  conquer  more  ground,  or  have  less  of  it?  It  de- 
pended on  the  battle.  And  that  hung,  I  was  sure,  on 
the  morale  of  the  fighter.  I  wondered  if  it  was  n't 
cracking  badly  — 

But  at  this  point  I  considered  how  late  it  was,  and 
whether  it  was  not  time  for  bed,  that  I  might  not  have 
bad  morale  myself,  with  a  headache  added  to  it,  at 
6.00  A.M. 

The  roar  again  —  I  began  breaking  it  up  once  more 
into  the  fragments  of  grind  and  rattle  that  composed 
it.  In  imagination  I  jumped  on  the  step  of  the  charg- 
ing-machine  as  it  moved  on  its  rails  past  Seven.  It 
shook  and  jarred  grumpily  about  its  business,  I 
thought. 

Near  Five  I  got  off,  and  started  to  make  front-wall. 
I  remembered  how  I  felt  on  a  front-wall  a  few  weeks 
ago.  I  had  tried  to  throw  my  mind  into  the  unsleeping 
numbness  that  protects  a  little  against  the  load  of 
monotony.  Other  men  I  had  seen  do  it,  drawing  a  cur- 
tain over  nine  tenths  of  their  brain;  not  thinking,  but 
only  day-dreaming  faintly  behind  the  curtain,  leav- 
ing enough  attention  to  the  fore  for  plunging  the 
shovel  into  dolomite,  and  keeping  the  arms  out  of  heat. 

Other  passages  from  open-hearth  shifts  came  into 


I  TAKE  A  DAY  OFF  123 

my  mind  in  violent  contrast.  Shorty,  who  was  always 
clearly  to  be  distinguished  anywhere  on  the  floor  be- 
cause he  wore  his  khaki  shirt  outside  his  pants,  quar- 
reled with  me  one  day,  and  showed  his  temper,  as  one 
shows  temper  in  Italy.  He  stood  by  the  drinking 
fountain  back  of  Number  4,  hair  on  end,  chest  bare, 
his  eyes  a  little  bloodshot,  and  his  mouth  sullen 
and  drawn  at  the  corners,  as  it  always  was.  The 
argument  was  about  a  shovel.  Shorty  took  out  a 
long  knife  from  his  pocket  and  explained  its  use  in 
argument. 

I  remembered  how  the  mill  stayed  in  your  mind 
when  you  left  it.  In  the  hour  or  so  in  which  you 
washed  up,  walked  home,  ate,  and  went  to  bed,  it 
loomed  as  a  black  sheet-iron  foreman,  demanding  that 
you  get  to  bed  and  prepare  for  the  noise  and  jar  it  had 
in  store  for  you  at  5.00  o'clock.  That  sense  of  im- 
minence was  a  thing  to  bear,  especially  if  you  won- 
dered whether  sleep  would  come  at  all. 

Then  there  were  long  strings  of  neutral  days  when 
you  did  not  think  well  of  life,  or  ill  of  it.  And  there 
were  the  occasional  satisfactions.  The  keen  pleasure 
of  acquiring  a  knack,  as  when  I  learned  to  "get  it 
across"  in  back-wall.  And  the  pleasures  of  rough- 
house.  Jock,  the  first-helper  on  Seven,  had  once  told 
me  in  a  burst  of  enthusiasm  for  furnace  work  that  he 
"liked  the  game  because  there  was  so  much  hell- 


raisin'  in  it.'' 


In  the  midst  of  listening  to  the  roar,  and  thinking  of 
shifts,  good  and  bad,  it  occurred  to  me  abruptly  that 


124  STEEL 

men  would  make  front-walls  in  front  of  hot  furnaces 
for  several  hundred  years,  in  all  likelihood.  I  won- 
dered. Perhaps  Mr.  Wells's  army  of  inventors  would 
alter  that.  For  several  hundred  years,  thousands  of 
men  had  labored  without  imagination  or  hope  in 
Egypt,  and  built  the  Pyramids.  There  were  similari- 
ties. Civilization  rested  on  the  uninspired,  unimagi- 
native drudgery  of  nine  tenths  of  mankind.  "  There 
have  always  been  hewers  of  wood,  and  drawers  of 
water,"  I  heard  some  elderly  person  say  at  me,  in  a 
voice  of  finality. 

I  did  not  stop  to  reply  to  the  implications  of  that 
sentence  in  my  own  mind,  but  thought  more  closely  of 
the  Pyramid-builders  I  had  known  in  the  pit. 

Marco  drew  Croatian  words  for  me  with  a  piece  of 
chalk  on  his  shovel,  and  I  put  down  English  ones  for 
him.  He  had  attended  night  school  after  working 
twelve  hours  a  day  in  Pittsburgh.  But  Marco  was, 
perhaps,  exceptionally  gifted. 

The  jobs  we  did  were  pick-and-shovel  jobs.  But 
have  you  ever  used  a  pick  on  hot  slag?  There  is  judg- 
ment and  knack,  and  he  is  a  fool  who  says  that  "any- 
one can  do  the  job."  Whenever  the  chance  for  special 
skill  happened  by,  as  in  hooking  the  crane  to  a  diffi- 
cult piece  of  scrap,  there  was  an  abundance,  and  much 
rivalry  to  show  it  off.  Could  such  substance  of 
"knacks"  ever  grow  into  anything  more  for  this 
"nine  tenths  of  mankind?  "  I  wonder. 

How  much  of  strength,  of  skill,  of  possible  loyalty, 
does  modern  industry  tap  from  the  average  Hunky? 


I  TAKE  A  DAY  OFF  125 

I  asked  the  question,  but  did  not  answer  it  —  for 
modern  industry.  I  answered  it  for  the  gang  in  the 
pit  and  the  crew  on  the  stoves  of  the  blast-furnace. 

Not  half. 

There  were  vast  unused  areas  of  men's  minds  and 
of  their  muscles,  as  well  as  of  their  powers  of  will,  that 
were  wholly  unreached  in  the  rough  job  adjustment  of 
modern  industry.  I  mean  among  the  so-called  groups 
of  "  lower  intelligence."  It  was  an  interesting  specula- 
tion whether  any  engineer  would  ever  find  a  means  of 
tapping  this  unused  voltage. 

I  suddenly  thought  how  inconceivable  the  stoppage 
of  that  roar  would  be.  A  silent  valley,  with  all  those 
ordered  but  gigantic  forces  stopped,  would  be  almost 
terrible.  But  just  such  a  silence  was  likely  to  happen. 
By  a  walk-out. 

The  great  strike  had  been  going  a  week,  in  other 
towns  --  tying  up  the  steel  production  of  the  country. 
Meetings  had  followed,  and  riots,  with  an  occasional 
bloody  conflict  with  the  "mud  guard"  of  Pennsyl- 
vania. 

Part  of  that  untapped  force!  I  said  to  myself  — 
dynamos  of  power  of  all  sorts.  Would  it  bludgeon  over 
a  change  in  steel  conditions,  or  flow  back,  waste  volt- 
age, into  the  ground? 

The  rumble  in  the  valley  again.  Could  I  hear  the 
shake  of  the  charging-machine  at  this  distance?  The 
Bessemer  glow  had  changed.  The  nail  mill  roar 
seemed  to  increase. 

I  went  down  the  hill.  When  I  reached  Mrs.  Farrell's 


126  STEEL 

and  climbed  into  my  back  room,  I  set  the  alarm  for 
4.00  o'clock,  putting  the  clock  a  foot  and  a  half  from 
the  bed.  It  has  a  knob  on  top,  and  you  can  stop  it  by 
knocking  down  the  knob  with  the  palm  of  your  hand. 
I  went  to  sleep,  to  dream  about  the  men  who  built  the 
Pyramids. 


IX 
"NO  CAN  LIVE" 

I  WENT  into  the  employment  office  one  day,  to  fix 
up  the  papers  of  my  transfer  to  the  blast-furnace,  and 
got  into  a  talk  with  Burke,  the  employment  manager, 
about  personnel  work. 

"What  do  you  think  of  the  game? "  I  asked. 

"  It 's  great,"  he  returned ;  "  it 's  working  with  human 
material  —  that's  what  it  is;  there's  nothing  like  it. 
But,"  he  added,  "if  you  have  any  ideas  about  unions 
keep  them  in  the  back  of  your  head  —  that  is,  if  you 
want  a  job  in  steel.  They  won't  stand  for  that  sort  of 
thing." 

He  looked  down  on  his  desk,  where  there  was  a 
news-clipping  of  the  demands  of  the  American  Fed- 
eration of  Labor's  Strike  Committee  —  the  twelve 
demands.  He  pointed  to  it. 

"We  give  them  practically  all  of  these  here  in 
Bouton,"  he  said,  "all  but  two  or  three." 

:'The  eight-hour  day?"   I  queried. 
'Yes,  we  give  them  the  eight-hour  day.   Overtime 
for  everything  over  eight  hours." 

"Could  I  stop  work  to-day  after  eight  hours'  work 
on  the  furnace?  "  I  asked.  "Could  anyone  before  six 
o'clock,  and  hold  his  job?" 

"Oh,  no,"  he  returned. 


128  STEEL 

66 1  should  call  that  a  twelve-hour  day,"  I  said. 

The  "safety  man"  came  in,  and  interrupted.  He 
was  a  stocky  young  man  with  the  intelligent  face  of 
an  engineer. 

"That  man  might  do  something  for  the  steel- 
worker,"  I  thought. 

The  men  on  the  furnaces  were  talking  about  the 
strike  that  day.  One  young  American  said:  "Well, 
strike  starts  Monday.  Damned  if  I  won't  go  if  the 
rest  do." 

There  were  no  leaders  about,  and  it  was  unlikely, 
perhaps,  that  any  would  appear.  There  seemed  to  be 
a  current  opinion  that  any  organizers  "get  taken  off 
the  train  before  they  get  to  Bouton." 

The  Old  Home  Week  Carnival  had  been  called  off 
through  the  influence  of  the  mill  authorities.  They 
were  afraid  of  a  strike  committee  coming  from  the 
next  town,  and  having  a  parade  to  lead  the  men  out. 

A  special  train  went  through  Bouton  that  day  at 
about  five  o'clock.  Everyone  watched  it  from  the 
furnaces,  and  speculated  what  it  meant.  It  was  a 
double-header  and  passed  through  at  top  speed. 

"Troops  going  to  quell  strike  riots,"  the  Assistant 
Superintendent,  Lonergan,  suggested.  "A  lot  of  those 
fellers  are  overseas  men  of  the  National  Guard. 
They  're  havin'  trouble  with  'em.  I  don't  blame  the 
boys  a  damn  bit  for  not  wantin'  'to  preserve  order  in 
the  steel  towns,'  as  the  papers  call  it,"  he  concluded, 
with  a  grin. 

Haverly,  an  American  blower,  came  up.    "Fight 


"NO   CAN   LIVE"  129 

for  democracy  overseas  and  against  it  over  here,"  he 
said. 

It  is  difficult  to  say  what  the  men  here  would  have 
done  if  they  had  had  leadership.  They  had  none, 
since  no  organizers  whatever  appeared,  and  no  speech- 
making  occurred  in  town.  There  was  pretty  good 
feeling  toward  the  company  itself,  which  is,  I  believe, 
one  of  the  best.  A  deep-seated  hatred,  however,  ex- 
isted against  the  whole  system  of  steel.  There  was 
anger  and  resentment  that  ran  straight  through, 
from  the  cinder-snapper  to  the  h'gh-paid  blowers, 
melters,  and,  in  some  cases,  to  the  superintendents. 

I  was  quite  amazed  —  because  of  what  the  news- 
papers were  continually  saying  —  at  the  absence  of 
any  sociological  ideas  whatever.  I  remember  one  day 
I  met  my  first  and  only  Socialist.  He  was  a  stove- 
tender  of  great  skill  and  long  experience;  he  told  me 
how  bad  he  thought  war  was,  and  how  he  could  n't 
understand  why  people  did  n't  live  in  peace  and  be 
sociable  with  one  another.  But,  though  there  were  few 
doctrines,  except  in  rare  instances,  there  was  a  mighty 
stream  of  complaint  against  certain  things  such  as 
the  company-owned  town,  the  twelve-hour  day,  the 
twenty-four-hour  shift,  the  seven-day  week,  and  cer- 
tain remediable  dangers.  It  pervaded  all  ranks. 

There  were  certain  days  in  my  summer  in  the  mills 
that  burned  among  the  others  like  a  hot  ingot  of  steel 
on  the  night-shift.  One  of  them  was  the  cleaning  out 
of  No.  IS  stove  early  in  my  gang  apprenticeship. 
Ordinarily,  the  duties  of  the  stove  gang  were  to  move 

10 


130  STEEL 

leisurely  from  stove  to  stove  while  they  were  alight, 
and  remove  cinder  from  the  combustion  chambers. 
It  was  pried  up  with  a  crowbar,  and  hoed  out  on  to 
a  wheelbarrow.  But  when  a  stove  was  cooled  for 
thorough  cleaning,  we  did  our  real  work. 

The  gas  was  turned  off  in  the  combustion  chamber 
on  the  night-shift,  and  the  stove  allowed  to  cool  for 
several  hours.  We  prepared  to  go  inside  her,  the  next 
morning,  to  cut  away  the  hardened  cinder.  John,  the 
Slav,  went  in  first,  with  pick  and  shovel,  and  worked 
an  hour.  Then  Tony  turned  to  me. 

"You  go  in  with  me,  I  show  you,"  he  said. 

We  put  on  wooden  sandals,  foot-shaped  blocks  an 
inch  thick,  with  lacing  straps,  donned  jackets  that 
buttoned  very  tight  in  the  neck,  and  pulled  down  the 
ear-flaps  of  our  kersey  caps.  Over  our  eyes  we  wore 
close-fitting  goggles.  We  looked  like  Dutch  peasants 
dressed  for  motoring.  The  combustion  chamber  is  a 
space  eight  or  ten  feet  long  by  three  or  four  wide.  It 
was  partly  filled  with  cooling  cinder,  some  of  it  yield- 
ing to  the  pick,  some  only  to  the  bar  and  sledge. 
Someone  shoved  an  electric  light  through  the  hot- 
blast  valve,  and  the  appearance  of  the  place  was  like 
a  mine  gallery.  The  chamber  was  hot  and  gaseous, 
but  it  was  quite  possible  to  work  inside  over  an  hour. 
After  Tony  had  loosened  several  shovelfuls,  I  could 
see  that  the  pick  failed  against  a  great  shelf  of  the 
stuff  that  glowed  red  along  its  base. 

"  Bar,"  he  called. 

The  bar  came  in  through  the  little  round  door  in 
three  or  four  minutes.  He  held  it  for  me,  and  I  sledged. 


"NO  CAN  LIVE"  131 

It  needed  a  little  work  like  this  to  make  you  yearn 
for  real  air.  The  heat  weakened  you  quickly.  We 
worked  about  forty  minutes,  and  then  lay  on  our 
bellies  and  wriggled  out.  The  means  of  entrance  and 
egress  is  a  small  door,  about  fourteen  inches  in  diame- 
ter, which  means  absorbing  a  good  deal  of  cinder 
when  you  caterpillar  through. 

We  finished  the  whole  job  in  three  hours,  and  then 
went  to  the  other  side  of  the  stove  and  cleared  out 
half  a  carload  of  flue-dust  from  the  brick  arches  that 
compose  the  groundwork  of  that  side  of  the  stove. 
The  dust  lay  a  foot  or  two  thick,  and  one  man  worked 
with  a  shovel  in  each  archway.  Here  it  was  hardly 
hot  at  all,  but  merely  thick  with  the  red  iron-dust. 
As  you  bent  over  inside  the  archways,  knee-deep  in 
the  stuff,  it  would  rise  and  settle  on  your  arms  and 
shoulders;  you  kept  up  a  blowing  with  your  nose  to 
keep  it  out.  Some  of  it  was  hard  and  soggy,  and 
pleasanter  shoveling.  Five  or  six  of  us  could  work  in- 
side the  stove  at  once,  in  the  different  archways,  each 
with  a  teapot  lamp  near  by,  and  a  large,  light  shovel. 
Men  at  the  entrances  hoed  the  stuff  out  as  we  threw 
back. 

But  it  was  the  next  day's  cleaning  that  I  remember 
most  strongly.  The  word  went  about  that  we  were  to 
"poke  her  out,"  to-morrow.  That  night  the  gang, 
and  especially  John,  the  Italian,  instructed  me  very 
seriously  to  bring  a  selected  list  of  clothing  the  next 
morning:  a  jacket,  a  cap  with  flaps  for  the  ears,  two 
pairs  of  gloves,  and  two  bandanna  handkerchiefs. 

We  went  on  top  of  Number  IS,  and  started  to  dress 


132  STEEL 

for  the  job  of  poking  her  out.  Over  our  faces  we  tied 
the  handkerchiefs,  leaving  only  our  eyes  exposed. 
Our  necks  and  ears  were  covered  with  the  winter 
caps,  our  hands  with  two  pairs  of  gloves. 

The  stove,  as  I  said,  looked  like  a  very  tall  boiler: 
half  was  a  long  brick-lined  flue,  where  the  gas  burned; 
half,  a  mass  of  brick  checkerwork  for  retaining  the 
heat.  Masses  of  flue-dust  had  clogged  the  holes  in  the 
checkerwork  and  reduced  its  power  for  holding  heat. 
It  was  our  job  to  poke  out  that  dust. 

John  and  Mike  and  I  unscrewed  the  trap  at  the  top 
very  deliberately,  and  dropped  a  ladder  down.  There 
was  a  space  left  at  the  top  of  the  checkerwork  for 
cleaning  purposes.  We  worked  on  top  of  that. 

Jimmy,  I  think,  went  in  first,  taking  a  teapot 
lamp  with  him  and  a  rod.  In  three  minutes  he  was 
out  again,  and  Mike  down.  I  began  to  wonder 
what  the  devil  they  faced  for  three  minutes  in  the 
chamber.  Tony  looked  at  me  and  said,  "I  teach 
you,  now." 

I  tied  the  handkerchiefs  around  my  face,  sticking 
the  end  of  one  in  my  collar,  and  followed  Tony. 

My  first  sensation,  as  I  stepped  off  the  ladder  to  the 
checkerwork  inside  the  stove,  was  relief.  It  was  hot, 
but  quite  bearable.  I  picked  my  way  slowly  to  Tony, 
and  tried  to  study  in  the  dull  light  his  motions  with 
the  rod.  The  dust  was  too  thick  and  the  lamp  guttered 
too  violently  for  me  to  follow  his  hand.  I  bent  over 
to  watch  the  end  of  his  rod,  and  recoiled.  I  felt  as  I 
had  when  the  ladle  got  under  me  on  the  manganese 
platform  —  flame  seemed  to  go  in  with  breath.  It  was 


"NO  CAN   LIVE"  133 

the  hot  blast  that  continued  to  rise  from  the  checker- 
work,  and  made  it  impossible  to  work  beyond  three 
minutes  in  the  stove. 

When  I  mounted  the  ladder,  and  moved  out  into 
the  air,  I  thought,  "  I  have  n't  learned  much  from 
Tony,  except  that  he  somehow  cleaned  the  checker- 
work,  and  it 's  best  to  keep  the  head  high ;  no  more 
bending." 

Five  minutes  passed,  and  I  was  scheduled  to  take 
my  turn  alone.  Every  man  poked  three  holes  and 
came  up.  I  was  full  of  resolutions  for  glory  and  poked 
four,  coming  up  rather  elated.  John  looked  at  me 
sadly  when  I  stepped  off  the  ladder. 

"What 's  the  matter,  Charlie?  You  only  poke  'em 
half  out."  He  simulated  my  motions  with  the  rod.  I 
had  n't  qualified. 

John,  the  Slav,  was  tying  his  handkerchief  back  of 
his  ears. 

"I  show  him;  you  come  with  me,  Charlie,  I  show 
you  all  right." 

I  was  n't  gleeful.  The  last  time  I  had  done  a  job 
with  John,  we  had  carried  pipes,  many  more  at  a 
time  than  anyone  else.  John,  I  anticipated,  would 
stay  in  the  stove,  poking  away,  till  ordinary  mortals 
lost  their  lungs. 

He  picked  up  a  poking  rod,  after  very  carefully 
putting  on  his  gloves,  and  went  over  to  the  ladder, 
descending  slowly.  I  followed  him  with  my  teeth  in 
my  lips,  feeling  for  the  rungs  of  the  ladder  with  my 
feet,  and  holding  my  poking  rod  in  my  right  hand. 
When  L  stepped  off  at  the  bottom,  I  felt  my  fingers 


134  STEEL 

closing  over  the  bent  handle  of  the  rod  in  a  death 
grip.  I  determined  on  no  half-way  poking. 

John  set  to  work  at  once,  and  I  after  him,  rattling 
my  rod  in  the  checkerwork  with  all  my  strength,  and 
pushing  her  in  up  to  the  hilt.  I  did  three  holes,  and 
John  four.  My  lungs  were  like  paper  on  fire,  when 
John  turned  to  go  up.  We  climbed  out  of  the  hole, 
and  took  down  the  handkerchiefs.  The  gang  looked 
at  me,  and  then  at  John. 

"He  do  all  right,"  he  cried  rather  loudly,  "every 
time  all  right." 

I  felt  extraordinarily  elated,  and  much  as  if  John 
had  given  me  a  diploma,  with  a  cum  laude  inscribed 
in  gold  letters. 

There  was  later  a  trip  down  inside  with  Jimmy.  He 
shouted  a  great  many  things  at  me  in  Anglo-Italian, 
which  caused  me  a  good  deal  of  anxiety  but  no  under- 
standing. I  learned  on  coming  up  that  he  was  trying 
to  tell  me  not  to  approach  the  combustion  chamber 
adjoining  the  checkerwork.  That  is  a  clear  shaft  to 
the  bottom.  I  was  given  in  some  detail  the  story  of 
the  man  who  fell  down  a  year  ago,  and  was  found 
with  no  life  in  him  at  the  bottom. 

"Kill  him  quick,"  said  John  the  Italian;  "take  him 
out  through  hot-blast  valve." 

Two  burns  on  my  wrists  were  an  embarrassing 
legacy  of  this  affair,  for  they  required  an  explanation 
whenever  I  took  off  my  coat.  My  arms  were  too  long 
and  shot  from  my  sleeves,  when  poking  out,  and  got 
exposed  to  the  gas  and  flame,  which  were  still  rising  in 
the  checkerwork. 


"NO  CAN  LIVE"  135 

This  incident  put  me  into  good  standing  with  John, 
the  Slav,  I  am  delighted  to  say.  He  was  a  stoical 
person,  without  much  conversational  warmth,  but  he 
approached  me  at  the  foot  of  the  furnace  steps  in  the 
late  afternoon;  "Some  people,  no  show  new  man;  I 
show  him,  I  Slovene,  no  Italian,  been  in  this  country 
eighteen  year."  That  was  about  all,  but  enough  for  a 
basis  of  friendship. 

I  sat  on  my  bed  and  sewed  up  a  rip  in  my  trousers, 
eleven  inches  long.  It  was  lucky  I  had  salvaged  that 
khaki  " housewife"  from  the  army.  My  gray  flannel 
shirt  lay  on  the  bed.  There  were  little  holes,  you 
could  pass  matches  through,  all  over  it,  with  brown 
edges  that  sparks  had  made. 

Would  that  sleeve  last? 

I  made  it  last. 

Then  there  were  the  pants. 

That  second-hand  paint-spattered  pair  of  mine  had 
lasted  five  days.  The  next,  a  sort  of  overally 
kind,  had  stood  it  a  month,  the  last  week  in  entire 
disgrace;  these  mohair  ones  I  got  at  the  Company 
store  were  going  yet.  But  the  seat  needed  emergency 
attention. 

After  sewing-time,  I  got  up  and  stared  out  of  the 
window  at  Mrs.  FarrelPs  four  stalks  of  corn.  They 
were  doing  well.  I  looked  across  at  the  back  road, 
along  which  a  junk-dealer's  wagon  jangled.  The  mud 
cliff  was  the  horizon  of  the  prospect.  I  watched  a  little 
stream  going  down  it  among  roots,  which  I  had 
watched  a  good  many  times  before,  and  finally  picked 


136  STEEL 

up  my  army  field-shoes,  and  took  them  out  to  a  Greek 
cobbler  for  resoling. 

I  shall  remember  for  all  time  the  "blowing  in"  of 
Number  9,  which  means  its  first  lighting  up.  A  blast- 
furnace, once  lit,  remains  burning  till  the  end  of  its 
existence.  I  got  inside  her,  and  was  delighted  to 
satisfy  a  deep-seated  curiosity:  we  crawled  in  the 
cinder  notch.  The  hearth  of  the  furnace  lay  six  or 
eight  feet  below  the  brick  flooring,  and  the  effect  of 
standing  inside,  with  the  fourteen  round  blowpipe 
holes  admitting  a  little  sunlight,  was  like  being  in  a 
round  ship's  cabin,  with  fourteen  portholes,  except 
that  the  hollow  furnace  shot  up  to  dark  distances 
that  the  light  did  n't  penetrate. 

We  built  a  scaffolding  six  or  eight  feet  above  the 
hearth  to  hold  firewood,  and  filled  in  beneath  with 
shavings  and  kindling.  Then  we  took  in  cords  upon 
cords  of  six-foot  sticks  and  set  them  on  end  on  top; 
there  were  two  or  three  layers  of  these,  and  on  top  of 
them,  according  to  the  orthodox  rule,  were  dumped 
quantities  of  coke,  dumped  down  from  the  top,  of 
course,  by  skips;  and  above  that,  light  charges  of  ore. 
Belowthe  scaffold,  we  spent  half  a  day  arranging  kin- 
dling, with  shavings  placed  at  each  blowpipe  hole. 
When  the  wood  was  arranged,  —  a  three-days'  job, 
—  the  crane  brought  us  some  barrels  of  petrol,  and  we 
poured  about  half  a  one  in  each  blowpipe  hole.  The 
cinder  notch  was  likewise  thoroughly  provided  with 
soaked  shavings.  That  was  to  be  the  torch. 

Men  assembled  as  at  a  house-raising.    Nobody 


"NO  CAN  LIVE"  137 

worked  from  11.00  to  12.00  on  the  day  of  blowing  in 
Number  9.  From  all  parts  of  the  blast-furnace  they 
came,  and  arranged  themselves  about  the  cinder  notch, 
and  on  the  girders  above.  The  men  and  their  bosses 
came.  There  was  the  labor  foreman,  and  the  foreman 
of  all  the  carpenters,  of  all  the  window-glass  fixers,  all 
the  blowers,  the  electricians,  the  master  mechanic. 
Then  came  the  superintendent  of  the  open-hearth  and 
Bessemer,  Mr.  Towers,  and  Mr.  Brown  his  boss;  and, 
finally,  Mr.  Erkeimer,  the  G.  M.,  with  an  unknown 
Mr.  Clark  from  Pittsburgh. 

We  waited  from  11.00  to  12.00  for  Mr.  Clark  to 
come  and  drop  a  spark  into  the  shavings.  When  he 
arrived  the  crowd  parted  quickly  for  him,  and,  with 
Mr.  Erkeimer  and  Mr.  Swenson,  he  stood  talking  and 
smiling  for  some  minutes  more  at  the  notch.  Mr. 
Clark  was  a  tall  slender  person,  with  glasses  and  an 
aspect  of  unfamiliarity  with  a  blast-furnace  environ- 
ment. No  one  knew,  or  ever  found  out,  who  he  was. 
Mr.  Swenson  showed  him,  very  carefully,  how  to 
ignite  the  shavings  with  a  teapot  lamp.  Twice  the 
photographer,  who  had  come  early,  got  focused  for 
the  awful  moment,  and  twice  Mr.  Clark  deferred 
lighting  the  shavings  and  went  on  talking  with 
Mr.  Swenson.  Finally,  he  bent  over  and  lit  them.  Mr. 
Swenson  rapidly  turned  to  the  gang  behind  him. 

"Three  cheers  for  Mr  Clark!"  he  cried,  raising  his 
hand.  When  it  is  recalled  that  none  of  us  knew  the 
man  we  cheered,  it  was  n't  a  bad  noise.  The  furnace 
smoked  lustily  in  a  few  minutes,  and  several  helpers 
rushed  around  it  to  thrust  red-hot  tapping  bars  in  the 


138  STEEL 

blow-holes.  They  ignited  at  once  the  petroleum  and 
shavings  packed  around  them. 

Immediately  after  the  cheers,  Mr.  Swenson's  bright- 
looking  office-boy  hurried  through  the  gang  with  a 
box  of  cigars,  another  immemorial  custom  in  operation. 
The  more  aggressive  got  cigars,  then  disappeared. 
It  was  a  little  odd  during  the  afternoon  to  see  a  sweat- 
drenched  cinder-snapper  at  his  work  with  a  long  black 
cigar  between  his  teeth.  When  they  were  burned  out, 
the  department  settled  back  to  normal  production. 

Many  years  might  pass  before  such  another  oc- 
casion in  that  place.  During  that  period  there  would 
be  no  slackening  of  the  melting  fires,  or  of  the  work  of 
the  helpers  who  kept  them  alive. 

I  stood  on  the  platform  waiting  for  the  10.05  train, 
and  turned  for  a  look  at  the  landscape  of  brick  and 
iron.  I  remembered  a  Hunky  who  had  worked  in  the 
tube-mill  for  eighteen  years  and  at  length  decided  to 
go  back  to  the  old  country.  On  the  day  he  left,  he 
went  out  the  usual  gate  at  the  tempered  after-work 
pace,  walked  the  gravel  path  to  the  railroad  embank- 
ment, and  stopped  for  a  moment  to  look  back  at  the 
mill.  He  stood  like  a  stone-pile  on  the  embankment 
for  a  quarter  of  an  hour,  looking  at  the  cluster  of  steel 
buildings  and  stacks.  He  had  spent  a  life  in  them, 
making  pipe,  and  I  have  n't  a  doubt  this  was  the  first 
time  it  came  to  him  in  perspective.  From  my  own 
brief  memories,  I  could  guess  at  those  fifteen  minutes : 
pain,  struggle,  monotony,  rough-house,  laughter,  en- 
durance, but  principally  toil  without  imagination. 


"NO   CAN   LIVE"  139 

I  thought  quickly  over  my  summer  in  the  mills,  and 
it  looked  rather  pleasurable  in  retrospect.  Things  do. 
There 's  a  verse  on  that  sentiment  in  Lucretius,  I 
think.  I  thought  of  sizzling  nights ;  of  bosses,  friendly 
and  unfriendly;  of  hot  back-walls,  and  a  good  first- 
helper;  of  fighting  twenty-four-hour  turns;  of  interest- 
ing days  as  hot-blast  man;  of  dreaded  five-o'clock 
risings,  and  quiet  satisfying  suppers;  of  what  men 
thought,  and  did  n't  think  —  And  again,  of  how  much 
the  life  was  incident  to  a  flinty-hearted  universe  and 
how  much  to  the  stupidity  of  men.  I  knew  there  were 
scores  of  matters  arranging  themselves  in  well-ordered 
data  and  conclusion  in  my  head.  I  had  a  cool  sense 
that,  when  they  came  out  of  the  thinking,  they  would 
not  be  counsels  of  perfection,  or  denunciations,  but 
would  have  substance,  be  able  to  weather  theorists, 
both  the  hard-boiled  and  the  sentimental,  being  com- 
pounded of  good  ingredients  —  tools,  and  iron  ore, 
and  the  experience  of  workmen. 

Is  there  any  one  thing  though  that  stands  out?  I 
heard  the  train  whistle  a  warning  of  its  arrival.  Per- 
haps, if  a  very  complicated  matter  like  the  steel-life 
can  be  compounded  in  a  phrase,  it  had  been  done  by 
the  third-helper  on  Six.  On  the  day  we  had  thrown 
manganese  into  a  boiling  ladle,  in  a  temperature  of 
130°,  he  had  turned  to  me  slowly  and  summed  it  all  up. 

"To  hell  with  the  money,"  he  said;  "no  can  live!" 


EPILOGUE 

A  FURNACE-WORKER 
TALKS  OVER  THE  TWELVE-HOUR  DAY 


EPILOGUE 

I  HAVE  tried  to  put  down  the  record  of  the  whole  of 
my  life,  as  I  lived  it,  and  the  whole  of  my  environ- 
ment, as  I  saw  and  felt  it,  among  the  steel-workers  in 
1919.  To  me  the  book  is  the  story  of  certain  obscure 
personalities,  and  the  record  of  certain  crude  and  vital 
experiences  we  passed  through  together.  I  think  it 
may  be  read  as  a  story  of  men  and  things. 

Many  people,  however,  have  asked  me  the  ques- 
tions: What  were  the  conditions  in  steel  and  what 
is  your  opinion  of  them?  What  do  you  think  of  the 
twelve-hour  day?  or,  How  bad  was  the  heat?  and  the 
like.  And,  What  do  you  suggest?  Since  no  man  who 
has  worked  in  an  American  steel  mill,  whatever  his 
sympathies  or  his  indiiference,  can  fail  to  have 
opinions  on  these  points,  I  have  decided  to  set  down 
mine,  for  what  they  are  worth,  as  simply  and  infor- 
mally as  I  can. 

There  is  a  proper  apology,  I  think,  that  can  be 
made  for  the  presumption  of  conclusions  based  upon 
an  individual  experience.  An  intimate  and  detailed 
record  of  processes  and  methods  and  the  physical 
and  mental  environment  of  the  workers  in  any  basic 
industry  is  rare  enough,  I  believe,  except  when  it  is 
heightened  or  foreshortened  for  a  political  purpose. 
No  industrial  reform  can  rest  upon  a  single  narrative 


144  STEEL 

of  personal  experience;  but  such  a  narrative,  if  genu- 
ine, can  supply  its  portion  of  data,  and  possibly  point 
where  scientific  research  or  public  action  can  follow. 

Let  me  state  my  bias  in  the  matter  as  well  as  I  can. 
I  was  by  no  means  indifferent  to  economic  and  social 
values  when  I  began  my  job;  in  fact,  I  confess  to  be- 
ing interested  keenly  in  most  of  them.  But  I  never 
sought  information  as  an  "investigator."  Most  of  my 
energy  of  mind  and  body  was  spent  upon  doing  the 
job  in  hand;  and  what  impressions  I  received  came 
unsought  in  the  course  of  a  day's  work.  I  began  my 
job  with  an  almost  equal  interest  in  the  process  of 
steel-making,  the  administration  of  business,  and  the 
problem  of  industrial  relations. 

Some  apology  I  owe  to  the  several  hundred  steel- 
workers  with  whom  I  worked,  and  the  many  thou- 
sands in  other  mills,  since  most  of  them  know  from  a 
far  longer  and  deeper  experience  the  conditions  and 
policies  of  which  I  speak.  My  sole  reason  for  raising 
my  own  voice  in  the  presence  of  this  multitude  of 
authorities  is  that  the  Hunkies,  who  constitute  the 
major  part,  are  unable  either  to  find  an  audience  or  to 
be  understood  if  they  find  one.  Again,  they  are  like 
Pete,  who,  when  I  asked  him  what  were  the  duties  of 
a  third-helper,  which  I  have  described  to  the  length  of 
several  pages  in  this  book,  replied:  "He  has  a  hell 
of  a  lot  to  do."  And  as  to  the  American  workers  and 
bosses,  most  of  them  lack  the  opportunity  of  any 
speaking  that  will  be  heard  beyond  their  own  furnaces ; 
and,  again,  they  are  too  close  to  their  environment  to 
see  what  is  in  it.  They  are  natives,  while  I  am  more 


EPILOGUE  145 

nearly  a  foreigner,  and  •  can  see  their  steel  country 
with  something  of  the  freshness  and  perspective  that 
a  foreigner  brings. 

I  want  to  add  that  the  management  of  the  mill 
where  I  worked  was  a  body  of  men  exceedingly 
efficient  and  fair-minded,  it  appeared  to  me;  and  any 
remarks  upon  the  twelve-hour  day,  or  other  condi- 
tions, are  critical  of  an  arrangement  typical  of  Amer- 
ican steel-management  as  a  whole,  and  not  of  indi- 
viduals or  a  locality. 

The  twelve-hour  day  makes  the  life  of  the  steel- 
worker  different  in  a  far-reaching  manner  from  the 
life  of  the  majority  of  his  fellow  workers. 

It  makes  the  industry  different  in  its  fundamental 
organization  and  temper  from  an  eight-hour  or  a  ten- 
hour  industry. 

It  transforms  the  community  where  men  live  whose 
day  is  twelve  hours  long. 

"What  is  it  really  like?  How  much  of  the  time  do 
you  actually  work  ?  Are  you  '  all  in '  when  you  wash 
up  in  the  morning  after  the  shift,  and  go  home?" 

To  tell  it  exactly,  if  I  can:  You  go  into  the  mill,  a 
little  before  six,  and  get  into  your  mill  clothes.  There 
may  be  the  call  for  a  front- wall  while  you  're  button- 
ing your  shirt.  You  pick  up  a  shovel  and  run  into  a 
spell  of  fairly  hot  work  for  three  quarters  of  an  hour. 
On  another  day  you  may  loaf  for  fifteen  minutes  be- 
fore anything  starts.  After  front-wall,  you  take  a 
drink  from  the  water  fountain  behind  your  furnace, 
and  wash  your  arms,  which  have  got  burned  a  little, 
and  your  face,  in  a  trough  of  water.  A  "clean-up" 

11 


146  STEEL 

job  follows  in  front  of  the  furnace,  which  means 
shoveling  slag  —  still  hot  —  down  the  slag-hole  for 
ten  minutes,  and  loading  cold  pieces  of  scrap,  which 
have  fallen  on  the  floor,  into  a  box.  Pieces  weigh 
twenty,  forty,  one  hundred  pounds;  anything  over? 
you  hook  up  with  a  chain  and  let  the  overhead  crane 
move  it.  This  for  a  half-hour. 

Suddenly  someone  says,  "  Back-wall  f"  Lasts  say 
thirty  or  forty  minutes.  It 's  hot  —  temperature, 
150°  or  160°  when  you  throw  your  shovelful  in  —  and 
lively  work  for  back  and  legs.  Everybody  douses  his 
face  and  hands  with  water  to  cool  off,  and  sits  down 
for  twenty  minutes.  Making  back-wall  has  affinities 
with  stoking,  only  it's  hotter  while  it  lasts.  The 
day  is  made  up  of  jobs  like  these  —  shoveling 
manganese  at  tap- time,  "making  bottom,"  bringing 
up  mud  and  dolomite  in  wheelbarrows  for  fixing  the 
spout,  hauling  fallen  bricks  out  of  the  furnace. 

They  vary  in  arduousness:  all  would  be  marked 
"heavy  work"  in  a  job  specification.  They  are  all 
"hard-handed"  jobs,  and  some  of  them  done  in  high 
heat.  Between,  run  intervals  from  a  few  minutes  to 
two  or  three  hours.  From  some  of  the  jobs  it  is  im- 
perative to  catch  your  breath  for  a  spell.  Sledging  a 
hard  spout,  making  a  hot  back-wall,  knocks  a  gang 
out  temporarily  —  for  fifteen  or  twenty  minutes;  no 
man  could  do  those  things  steadily  without  inter- 
ruption. It  is  like  the  crew  resting  on  their  oars  after 
a  sprint.  Again,  some  of  the  spells  between  are  just 
leisure;  the  furnace  does  n't  need  attention,  that 's  all; 
you  're  on  guard,  waiting  for  action.  Furnace  work 


EPILOGUE  147 

has  similarities  with  cooking;  any  cook  tends  his  stove 
part  of  the  time  by  watching  to  see  that  nothing 
burns  up. 

I  have  had  two  or  three  hours'  sleep  on  a  "good" 
night-shift;  two  or  three  "easy"  days  will  follow  one 
another.  Then  there  will  come  steady  labor  for  nearly 
the  whole  fourteen  hours,  for  a  week. 

So,  briefly,  you  don't  work  every  minute  of  those 
twelve  hours.  Besides  the  delays  that  arise  out  of  the 
necessities  of  furnace  work,  men  automatically  scale 
down  their  pace  when  they  know  there  are  twelve  or 
fourteen  hours  ahead  of  them :  seven  or  eight  hours  of 
actual  swinging  of  sledge  or  shovel.  But  some  of  the 
extra  time  is  utterly  necessary  for  immediate  re- 
cuperation after  a  heavy  job  or  a  hot  one.  And  none 
of  the  spells,  it  should  be  noticed,  are  "your  own 
time."  You  're  under  strain  for  twelve  hours.  Nerves 
and  will  are  the  Company's  the  whole  shift  —  whether 
the  muscles  in  your  hands  and  feet  move  or  are  still. 
And  the  existence  of  the  long  day  makes  possible 
unrelieved  labor,  hard  and  hot,  the  whole  turn  of 
fourteen  hours,  if  there  is  need  for  it. 

Inseparable  from  the  twelve-hour  day  in  the  open- 
hearth  where  I  worked  were  the  twenty-four-hour 
shift,  and  the  seven-day  week. 

What  does  it  mean  to  make  steel  twenty-four 
hours  a  day?  to  your  muscles,  to  your  thoughts,  to 
the  production  of  steel?  Sunday  morning,  at  7.00, 
you  begin  work.  There  is  an  hour  off  at  5.00  p.  M. 
Front-wall,  fix  spout,  tap,  back-wall,  front-wall,  fix 
spout,  tap,  back-wall  —  the  second  half  is  something 


148  STEEL 

of  a  game  between  time  and  fatigue.  For  a  hot  back- 
wall,  or  sledging  out  a  bad  tap-hole,  may  as  easily 
come  upon  you  at  5.00  or  6.00  of  the  second  morning 
as  at  noon  of  the  first  day. 

I  Ve  worked  "long  turns"  that  I  did  n't  mind  over- 
much, and  others  that  ground  my  soul.  If  you  are 
young  and  fit,  you  can  work  a  steady  twenty-four 
hours  at  a  hot  and  heavy  job  and  "get  away."  But 
in  my  judgment  even  the  strongest  of  the  Czecho- 
slovaks, Serbs,  and  Croats  who  work  the  American 
steel-furnaces  cannot  keep  it  up,  twice  a  month,  year 
after  year,  without  substantial  physical  injury.  "A 
man  got  to  watch  himself,  this  job,  tear  himself  down," 
the  second-helper  on  Seven  told  me.  He  had  worked 
at  it  six  years,  and  was  feeling  the  effects  in  nerves 
and  weight.  Let  me  make  an  exception :  one  Hunky,  a 
helper  on  Number  4,  was  famed  for  having  "a  back 
like  a  mule."  He  could,  I  am  sure,  work  seven  twenty- 
four-hour  shifts  a  week  with  comfort.  But  for  all  other 
men,  with  the  exception  of  Joe,  the  long  turn  is  an  un- 
reasonable overtaxing  of  human  strength.  Lastly,  the 
effort  of  will,  the  "nerve"  that  the  thing  calls  for 
in  the  last  hours  before  that  second  morning,  is  too 
heavy  a  demand,  for  any  wages  whatever.  The  third- 
helper  on  Number  8  took,  I  think,  a  reasonable  at- 
titude when  he  said:  "To  hell  with  the  money,  no  can 
live!" 

The  "long  turn"  leaves  a  man  thoroughly  tired, 
"shot,"  for  several  shifts  following.  As  I  said  in  the 
first  part  of  this  book,  it  is  hardly  before  Friday  that 
the  gang  makes  up  sleep  and  comes  into  the  mill  in 


EPILOGUE  149 

normal  temper.  Here  is  the  condition.  You  have  ten 
hours  for  recuperation  after  twenty-four  hours'  work. 
Washing  up  in  a  hurry,  getting  breakfast,  and  walking 
home  gets  you  in  bed  by  8.00.  Eight  hours'  sleep  is 
the  best  you  can  get.  At  4.00  o'clock  you  must  dress, 
eat,  and  walk  to  the  mill.  Men  who  live  an  hour  or 
more  from  the  mill,  as  some  do,  must,  of  course,  sub- 
tract that  time  as  well  from  sleep.  After  the  ten  hours 
off,  you  return  to  the  mill  at  5.00,  to  begin  another 
four  teen-hours'  steel-making.  That  night  is  un- 
questionably the  worst  of  the  two-weeks'  cycle.  The 
nervous  excitement  that  helps  any  man  through  the 
twenty-four  turn  has  gone  —  quite.  The  seven  or 
eight  hours  of  day  sleep  seem  to  have  taken  that 
away  without  substituting  rest;  and  what  you  have 
on  your  hands  is  an  overfatigued  body,  refusing  to  be 
goaded  further.  My  observation  was  that,  on  this 
Monday  after,  men  made  mistakes;  there  were  argu- 
ments, bad  temper,  and  fights,  and  a  much  higher 
frequency  of  collision  with  the  foreman.  Efficiency, 
quality,  discipline  dropped. 

The  other  accompaniment  of  the  twelve-hour  shift, 
the  averaging  of  seven  working-days  per  week,  has,  I 
am  convinced,  an  equally  bad  physiological  effect 
upon  the  healthiest  of  men.  As  I  have  said  earlier, 
"the  twenty-four  hours  off,"  which  comes  once  a 
fortnight  on  alternate  weeks  to  the  twenty-four-hour 
shift,  is  a  curiously  contracted  holiday.  It  comes  at 
the  conclusion  of  fourteen  hours'  work  on  the  night- 
shift,  and  is  immediately  followed  by  ten  hours'  work 
on  the  day-shift.  As  far  as  I  could  observe,  men  went 


150  STEEL 

on  a  long  debauch  for  twenty-four  hours,  or,  if  the 
week  had  been  particularly  heavy,  slept  the  entire 
twenty-four.  In  the  first  instance  they  deprived  them- 
selves of  any  sleep,  and  went  to  work  Monday  in  an 
extraordinarily  jaded  condition.  In  the  second,  they 
forfeited  their  only  holiday  for  two  weeks. 

Another  feature  that  impresses  you  when  you 
actually  work  under  the  system  is  that  the  sleep  you 
get  is  troubled,  at  best.  You  are  compelled  to  go  to 
bed  one  week  by  day,  and  the  next  by  night.  By 
about  Friday,  I  found  my  body  getting  itself  adjusted 
to  day  sleep;  but  the  change,  of  course,  was  due  again 
Monday.  And  yet,  by  comparing  my  sleeping  hours 
with  those  of  my  fellow  workers,  I  found  my  day  rest 
was  averaging  better  than  theirs.  Many  of  them,  I 
found,  went  to  bed  at  9.00  in  the  morning  and  got  up 
about  2.00.  They  complained  of  being  unable  to  sleep 
properly  by  day.  The  body  will  adjust  itself  to  con- 
tinued day  sleeping,  I  know;  but  apparently  not  to 
the  weekly  shifts,  from  day  sleep  to  night  sleep, 
customary  in  steel. 

The  "long  turn"  of  twenty-four  hours  and  the 
"seven-day  week"  I  have  never  heard  defended, 
either  in  the  mill  by  any  foreman  or  workman,  or  out- 
side by  any  member  of  the  management,  or  even  in  a 
public  statement.  If,  by  an  arrangement  of  extra 
workers,  it  were  possible  to  eliminate  these  features 
and  still  keep  the  twelve-hour  work-day  for  six  days 
a  week,  there  would,  I  think,  be  a  certain  number  of 
men  ready  enough  to  work  under  that  arrangement. 
I  met  one  man,  for  example,  who  said:  "Good  job, 


EPILOGUE  151 

work  all  time,  no  spend,  good  job  save."  There  are  a 
few  foreign  workers  whose  plan  is  to  work  steadily 
for  ten  or  fifteen  years,  and  then  carry  the  money 
back  to  the  old  country.  These  men  are  willing  to 
spend  the  maximum  time  within  mill  walls,  since  they 
have  no  intention  of  marrying,  settling  down,  and  be- 
coming Americans.  But  their  numbers  are  small,  and 
the  desirability  of  their  type  is  questionable.  It  is  un- 
wise, at  any  rate,  to  build  the  labor  policy  of  a  great 
industry  in  their  interest. 

On  those  first  night-shifts  I  wondered  if  my  feelings 
on  the  arrangement  of  hours  were  not  solely  those  of  a 
sensitive  novice.  I  'd  "get  used  to  it,"  perhaps.  But 
I  found  that  first-helpers,  melters,  foremen,  "old 
timers,"  and  "Company  men"  were  for  the  most  part 
against  the  long  day.  They  were  all  looking  forward, 
with  varying  degrees  of  hope,  to  the  time  when  the 
daily  toll  of  hours  would  be  reduced. 

The  twelve-hour  day  gives  a  special  character  to  the 
industry  itself  as  well  as  to  the  men.  I  remember 
noticing  the  difference  in  pace,  in  tempo,  from  that  of  a 
machine  shop  or  a  cotton  mill.  Men  learn  to  cultivate 
deliberate  movement,  with  a  view  to  the  fourteen- 
hour  stretch  they  have  before  them.  When  I  began 
work  with  a  pickaxe  on  some  hot  slag,  on  my  first 
night,  I  was  reproached  at  once:  "Tak'  it  eas',  lotza 
time  before  seven  o'clock."  And  the  foremen  fell  in 
with  the  men.  They  winked  at  sleeping,  for  they  did 
it  themselves. 

Another  kind  of  inefficiency  that  flowed  quite 
naturally  from  excessive  hours  was  "absenteeism," 


152  STEEL 

and  aJiigh  "turnover"  of  labor.  Men  kept  at  the  job 
as  long  as  they  could  stick  it,  and  then  relaxed  into  a 
two  or  three  weeks'  drunk.  Or  they  quit  the  Company 
and  moved  to  another  mill,  for  the  sake  of  change  and 
a  break  in  the  drudgery.  I  remember  an  Austrian 
with  whom  I  worked  in  the  "pit,"  who  said  he  was 
going  to  get  drunk  in  Pittsburgh,  go  to  the  movies, 
and  move  to  Johnstown  the  following  Monday.  He 
had  been  on  the  job  three  weeks.  New  faces  appeared 
on  the  gangs  constantly,  and  dropped  out  as  quickly. 
I  achieved  my  promotion  from  common  labor  in  the 
pit  to  the  floor  of  the  furnace  by  supplying  on  a 
twenty-four-hour  shift,  when  absentees  are  apt  to  be 
numerous,  and  it  is  hard  fully  to  man  the  furnaces. 
The  company  kept  a  large  number  of  extra  men  on  its 
pay  roll  because  of  the  number  of  absentees,  and  the 
turnover  percentage  ran  high. 

It  is  impossible  to  live  under  this  loose  regime - 
with  high  turnover,  and  the  work-pace  necessarily 
keyed  low  because  of  the  excessive  burden  of  hours 
spent  under  the  roof  of  the  mill  —  and  not  wonder  if 
there  is  n't  an  engineering  problem  in  it.  The  impres- 
sion was  of  a  vast  wastage  of  man-hours.  The  question 
suggested  itself:  "Is  it  in  the  long  run,  good  business 
—  an  efficient  thing?"  An  exhaustive  investigation 
by  engineers  and  economists  could  surely  be  made  to 
answer  this  question. 

People  ask:  "Is  there  any  mechanical  or  metal- 
lurgical reason  for  the  twelve-hour  day  ?  "  The  answer 
is:  No.  There  are  several  plants  of  independent  steel 
companies  that  run  on  a  three-shift,  eight-hour  basis ; 


EPILOGUE  153 

and  the  steel  mills  in  England,  France,  Germany,  and 
Italy  operate  with  three  eight-hour  shifts.  The  long 
day  is  not  a  metallurgical  necessity,  therefore.  The 
metallurgical  explanation  of  the  twelve-hour  day, 
however,  is  this.  The  process  of  making  iron  or  steel 
is  necessarily  a  continuous  one,  because  the  heat  of  the 
furnaces  must  be  conserved  by  keeping  up  the  fires 
twenty-four  hours  a  day.  So  the  division  into  either 
two  shifts  of  twelve  hours  or  three  shifts  of  eight  be- 
comes imperative.  Other  industries  might  reduce 
their  hours  gradually  from  twelve  to  ten,  and  then  to 
nine.  With  steel  the  full  jump  from  twelve  to  eight 
must  be  made.  Without  doubt,  this  metallurgical 
factor  accounts  in  some  measure  for  the  conservatism 
of  the  steel  companies  in  making  the  change. 

It  is  none  of  my  business,  in  summing  up  a  personal 
experience,  to  review  the  story  of  steel  mills  which 
have  undertaken  a  three-shift  plan  of  operation,  of 
eight  hours  each,  in  place  of  the  two  shifts  of  twelve. 
But  the  study  has  been  made  by  engineers  and  econo- 
mists, who  have  collected  figures  as  to  the  cost  of 
operation  on  an  eight-hour  basis  as  contrasted  with  a 
twelve.  The  increased  cost  in  product  which  such  a 
change  would  entail  is  between  three  and  five  per  cent.1 

The  community  of  workers  takes  on  a  special 
character,  where  men  live  whose  day  is  twelve  hours 
long.  "We  have  n't  any  Sundays,"  the  men  said;  and 
"There  is  n't  time  enough  at  home."  This  is  the  most 

lThe  Three  Shift  System  in  Steel — Horace  B.  Drury:  an  address  to  the 
Taylor  Society  and  certain  sections  of  the  Am.  Soc.  Mech.  Engineers  and  of 
the  Am.  Inst.  Electr.  Engineers,  Dec.  3,  1920. 


154  STEEL 

far-reaching  effect  of  "  hours "  in  steel,  I  think,  and 
easily  transcends  the  others. 

"What  do  you  do  when  you  leave  the  mill  ? "  people 
ask.  "On  my  night-week,"  I  answer,  "I  wash  up,  go 
home,  eat,  and  go  to  bed."  Anything  that  happens  in 
your  home  or  city  that  week  is  blotted  out,  as  if  it 
occurred  upon  a  distant  continent;  for  every  hour  of 
the  twenty-four  is  accountable,  in  sleep,  work,  or  food, 
for  seven  days;  unless  a  man  prefers,  as  he  often  does, 
to  cheat  his  sleep-time  and  have  his  shoes  tapped,  or 
take  a  drink  with  a  friend. 

The  day-week  is  decidedly  better.  You  work  jpnly 
ten  hours,  from  seven  to  five.  Those  evenings  men 
spend  with  their  families,  or  at  the  movies,  or  going  to 
bed  early  to  rest  up  for  the  "long  turn."  It  is  not, 
however,  as  if  it  were  a  "ten-hour  industry."  Some 
of  the  wear  and  tear  of  the  seven  fourteen-hour  shifts 
of  the  night-week  protracts  itself  into  the  day-week, 
and  you  hear  men  saying:  "This  ten-hour  day  seems 
to  tire  me  more  than  the  fourteen;  funny  thing." 
However  the  week  may  be  divided  up,  it  is  impossible 
to  keep  the  human  body  from  recording  the  fact  that 
it  averages  seven  twelve-hour  days,  or  eighty-four 
hours  of  work,  in  the  week. 

For  the  men  who  did  a  straight  twelve  hours,  "six 
to  six,"  for  seven  days,  the  sense  of  "no  time  off"  was 
very  strong.  I  worked  these  hours  for  a  time  on  the 
blast-furnace,  and  remember  that  the  complaint  was, 
not  so  much  that  there  was  n't  some  bit  of  an  evening 
before  you,  but  that  there  was  rip  untired  time  when 
you  were  good  for  anything  —  work  or  play.  When 


EPILOGUE  155 

you  had  sat  about  for  perhaps  an  hour  after  supper, 
you  recovered  enough  to  crave  recreation.  A  movie 
was  the  very  peak  to  which  you  could  stir  yourself. 
There  were  men  who  went  further.  I  knew  a  young 
Croat  in  Pittsburgh  who  attended  night-school  after  a 
twelve-hour  day.  But  he  is  the  only  one  of  all  the  steel- 
workers  I  met  who  attempted  such  heroism.  And  he 
had  to  stop  after  a  few  weeks. 

Now  it  should  be  mentioned  that  some  of  the  social 
life  that  most  workers  find  outside  the  mill  gets 
squeezed  somehow  into  it.  In  the  spells  between  front- 
walls  we  used  to  talk  everything,  from  scandal  about 
the  foreman  to  the  presidential  election.  The  daily 
news,  labor  troubles,  the  late  war,  the  second-helper's 
queer  ways  passed  back  and  forth  when  you  washed 
up,  or  ate  out  of  your  bucket,  or  paused  between 
stunts.  Then  there  was  kidding,  comradely  boxing, 
and  such  playfulness  as  hitching  the  crane-hooks  to  a 
man's  belt.  One  first-helper  remarked:  "I  like  the 
game  because  there  's  so  much  hell-raisin'  in  it." 

But  this  is  hardly  a  substitute  for  a  man's  time 
to  himself,  for  seeing  his  wife,  knowing  his  own 
children,  and  participating  in  the  life  of  larger  groups. 
Soldiers  have  a  faculty  for  taking  so  good-humoredly 
the  worst  rigors  of  a  campaign,  that  some  people  have 
made  the  mistake  of  turning  their  admirable  adapt- 
ability into  a  justification  for  war. 

The  twelve-hour  day,  I  believe,  tends  to  discourage 
a  man  from  marrying  and  settling  into  a  regular  home 
life.  Men  complained  that  they  did  n't  see  their 
wives,  or  get  to  know  their  children,  since  the  schedule 


156  STEEL 

of  hours  shrunk  matters  at  home  to  food,  sleep,  and 
the  necessities.  "My  wife  is  always  after  me  to  leave 
this  game,"  Jock  used  to  say,  the  first-helper  on 
Seven.  Mathematically,  it  figures  something  like  this : 
twelve  hours  of  work,  an  hour  going  to  and  from  the 
mill,  an  hour  for  eating,  eight  hours  of  sleep  —  which 
leaves  two  hours  for  all  the  rest,  shaving,  mowing  the 
lawn,  and  the  "civilizing  influence  of  children." 

I  have  no  brief  to  offer  for  the  eight-hour  day  as  a 
general  panacea  for  evils  in  industry.  I  merely  bear 
witness  to  the  fact  that  the  twelve-hour  day,  as  I 
observed  it,  tended  either  to  destroy,  or  to  make  un- 
reasonably difficult,  that  normal  recreation  and  par- 
ticipation in  the  doings  of  the  family  group,  the 
church,  or  the  community,  which  we  ordinarily 
suppose  is  reasonable  and  part  of  the  American  in- 
heritance. 

Steel  has  often  been  described  by  its  old  timers  as  a 
"he-man's  game."  That  has  even  figured  as  an  argu- 
ment against  any  innovation  that  might  lighten  the 
load  of  the  workers  in  it,  and  against  any  change  in 
the  twelve-hour  day  itself.  The  industry  has  certainly 
a  rough-and-tumble  quality  and  a  dangerous  streak 
in  it,  that  will  always  call  for  men  with  some  tough- 
ness of  fibre.  But  I  question  whether  the  quality  of 
the  men  it  attracts,  and  the  type  it  moulds  within  its 
own  ranks,  will  ever  be  improved  by  the  twelve- 
hour  day.  The  excessive  hours,  I  know,  operate  as  a 
check  against  many  younger  men,  who  would  other- 
wise enter  the  industry.  The  inherent  fascination  of 
making  steel  is,  I  think,  very  great.  It  was  for  me. 


EPILOGUE  157 

But  the  appeal  is  the  mechanical  achievement  of  the 
industry,  its  size,  power,  and  importance,  even  its 
dangers.  The  twelve-hour  day,  on  the  other  hand, 
tends  to  place  a  premium  on  time-serving  and  drudg- 
ery, in  lieu  of  the  more  masculine  qualities  of  adven- 
ture and  initiative. 


YC  261(5 


GENERAL  LIBRARY  -  U.C.  BERKELEY 


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UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 
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